Past Futures
by ILM
Summary: Sometimes, possibilities come back to haunt us. And this time, she's hiding it.
1. Chapter 1

This is my first attempt at a multi-chapter fic. Bear with me, I promise I know where I'm going!

**Disclaimer: They're not mine. Clearly I can't control them.**

* * *

It's eerily quiet as he walks through the lab, but he's used to it these days. He's given up trying to make her leave earlier. After all, he's nearly as bad.

Her door is shut and he's taken aback. She rarely shuts it when she's alone. He thinks maybe she's gone to sleep in there and eases it open quietly, hoping not to disturb her. When he sees she isn't there, he frowns.

_Not in the lab? It's only…_ He checks his watch. _2045._

He wonders if she told him she had plans and he conveniently ignored it. Sometimes he does that. Sometimes he just doesn't want to know.

"Bones!" he calls, wondering if she's simply elsewhere for a moment.

His voice echoes in the empty surroundings and he knows instinctively that he is alone, feeling slightly stupid for shouting. He checks his phone, even though he knows he would have heard it.

He wants to call her, but no excuse presents itself. Instead, his thumb moves rapidly as he sends a message.

_Stopped by lab, where are you? Hungry? Will stop at diner on way home, text if joining me._

He hits send and stares at the screen as the animated envelope floats into oblivion. It's been four days since he last saw her and it seems like a longer time than it did three years ago. Two days ago she had responded to an enquiring text in her typically brief fashion. _Busy. Glad you had good weekend. Will call later in week._ He no longer finds her brevity dismissive.

In the car, he puts the phone on the seat next to him, wondering if she'll accept his invitation. He misses her. These days, he doesn't hide his attachment to her, although he often wants to forget its extent. The knowing look in Angela's eyes is all it takes to force denial to the surface. He doesn't want it ruined before it starts by a well-meaning but premature word.

By the time he reaches the diner, the screen remains unlit. He won't see her tonight. With a sigh, he locks the car and heads inside, wondering whether coffee and pie will be anywhere near an adequate substitute.

"Has Dr Brennan been in?" he asks, as Ramona pours his coffee. She is new, new enough to be learning the menu still, but already she knows them.

She frowns. "She came in yesterday morning, around eleven. Picked up a cheesecake."

He stares at her. "Cheesecake?"

"Yep, baked lemon. Must have been an advance order too, they aren't on the menu." She offers a mug.

Steam coils up from the surface as warmth tingles through his fingers. "She was on her own?"

Ramona looks at him, seeming confused. "Think so. She just came in and went again."

"Okay." He stares at the mug like he is surprised by the contents.

"I'll bring your pie over when it's hot," she says, her voice softening so much that he knows she thinks something is niggling him.

His eyes jerk up. "Yes… Thank you."

Idly stirring a spoon through his coffee, he wonders where she is. He tells himself that it's ridiculous to read anything into a cheesecake purchase, but he can't help it. In nearly four years, he isn't sure if he's seen her eat cheesecake, much less pre-order one.

_It's dessert, moron. Stop brooding about dessert._

The supplementary voice in his head is getting ruthless these days, as it tries to quash unwanted jealous instincts. It needs to be ruthless to override his deep-seated impulses. He has never been a man to suppress anything and he would rather not consider why he has become one.

"Here you go." Ramona's cheerful voice breaks through the fog he has created. "Careful, it's really hot."

He thanks her and picks up his spoon. It remains poised as he watches the ice cream melt, sliding in slow caress over the pastry.

_She's seeing someone. She must be. And that's why she's not answering. That's why she needs the cheesecake._

The spoon cracks the top crust viciously. Somewhere deep in the recesses of his mind, his ruthless supplementary voice points out that cheesecake does not equal boyfriend does not equal not answering, but his primary conscience is quick to gag its compatriot.

The first mouthful of pie is too hot and his tongue stings. The slight sourness retained in the apple comforts him, not allowing the sugar to overpower with its unrelenting sweetness. He swallows and feels the burning slide down his throat.

_I bet_ – stabs with the spoon – _she thinks I'll go all_ – the pastry splits under his teeth – _weird and shit on her. I bet she_ – an audible swallow of an ambitious mouthful – _thinks I won't be supportive._

Supplementary voice reminds him that supportiveness is never the first thing on his mind when other men in her life are concerned. Primary voice tells supplementary to swivel.

The buzz of his phone breaks into his vicious pie-consumption.

_Out with friend. Will phone tomorrow. Have a good night._

Now, her concision irritates him. Would it kill her to be a little more animated sometimes?

And friend? He spends enough time with her to know her friends. He spends enough time with her to know that she has far more acquaintances than real friends – and he doesn't let himself think about former partners. He spends enough time with her to know that if she isn't with him, she's most likely with Angela, who she would always reference by name. 'Friend' means man.

Supplementary voice reminds him that friend doesn't have to mean man and that man doesn't have to mean boyfriend. It goes on to add that her men never last long anyway. Primary voice gags supplementary without thought.

"Pie okay, honey?" Ramona slides his plate from before him.

He smiles at her, aware that it is automatic and not genuine. "Wonderful, thanks."

"More coffee?"

He hesitates. "Um… No thanks, I'll be on my way."

She smiles at him on her way to the kitchen, and he thinks he sees her understanding behind the everyday kindness.

He leaves money on the table and leaves, waving brightly at Ramona as he pushes through the door; outside, he makes no more effort and his face falls. He doesn't want to be this man, the man who expresses his hurt in snipes and failed humour. He wants to be the man who is happy when she is, simply because he knows that she has what is best for her at that moment. He wants to be the man who encourages her to live, despite knowing that he might not occupy the place in her life he desires.

It's what his mother would describe as a crisp night, which to everyone else would mean freezing. Ice is beginning to form on the sidewalks, even this early, and he suspects the roads will be treacherous tomorrow. Maybe he can offer to pick her up on his way in.

The buzz of his phone has him fumbling through his pockets.

_Parker says goodnight. Still okay to pick him up after school?_

Even the unexpected night with his son, arranged just yesterday, only dulls his self-created bitterness.

_Still fine, will meet him at the gates. Say goodnight from me._

The car is cold and he turns the heater dial violently, well aware that he is taking his frustration out on equipment. His other option is one he refuses to contemplate. He knows he can't just turn up at her apartment, invading her life with no excuse.

Supplementary voice reminds him that he's her partner, not her possessor. Primary voice buries supplementary without ceremony.

* * *

**Please forgive the odd Anglicisation if I've missed any - I only caught that I'd written pavements instead of sidewalks on my second read-through! Ah, the perils of Britishness...**

**My merry band of reviewers keep me going! I'd like to know if this is worth me continuing, quite happy to leave it as a one-shot if people think it works best that way.**


	2. Chapter 2

Sorry for the delay - this one proved really difficult and reminded me why I started with one-shots! Thanks for all the encouragement, it helped me keep going.

**Disclaimer: They still aren't mine. They just won't do as I say!**

* * *

Angela's stare unnerves her.

"You'll have to tell him," her friend points out.

"Why?" She genuinely isn't sure what Angela means. "He doesn't have to know everything."

Angela's eyes narrow. "Oh, I think you'll find he does. He probably already thinks something's off. You've not seen him in five days, and you can't tell me _that's_ normal these days."

"Angela… This isn't something he needs to be involved in."

"Have you considered he might be able to help?"

She lifts her head. "Yes. But nothing to help with yet," she says calmly.

"If you tell him now… Well, it just precludes any misunderstandings later."

"He's not a child, Angela – he understands I don't tell him everything." She shakes her head, frustrated. She had intended to keep this to herself.

She watches Angela and she knows that behind the carefully impassive eyes there is an argument forming. Sometimes she thinks it is a good thing she has Angela to stop her sinking into her rarefied world; now is one of the moments she wishes she had never allowed anyone to see past the academic facade. She is still learning to value social interaction, not through deliberate effort but through the gentle insinuation of her friends.

Her phone rings just as Angela opens her mouth, and she knows she shouldn't be grateful. The number isn't recognised and she turns away to answer it.

"Brennan."

"It's Jenny, did you hear anything?"

"Not yet… I'll call you when I do, I promise."

"I'm worried – I thought, well, I thought he'd call me."

She hesitates. "I'm sure it's nothing, he probably just needs space. There've not been any reports of bodies found."

"Bodies?!" The pitch of Jenny's voice rises. "Tempe, he's not… he's not _depressed_."

"No – in case-" She cuts herself off, irritated by the echo of Booth's voice in her head. _Don't be so blunt_.

"Well… I guess that's a good thing," Jenny says hopefully. "Means he'll come back, right?"

"I don't – I don't know." She can't lie. She can hide the truth, she can smother a likelihood, but she still can't reassure of an unclear resolution.

"And you'll talk to… I don't remember his name."

"Booth," she supplies automatically, startled by Angela's sudden intake of breath behind her. "Um, yes. I will."

There is a sigh on the other end of the line, and she can't help wondering if she is just perpetuating self-delusion.

"Thanks Tempe. I'm… Well, I'm sorry to get in touch like this."

"It's okay," she responds, another reflex response that she knows she wouldn't have given 3 years ago. _Social niceties_, she thinks to herself. _Booth again_.

"I meant to call you – but you know what he's like."

She can hear the semi-pleading behind Jenny's voice and doesn't like it. People don't need to make excuses. She is just as bad at maintaining friendships. "It's okay," she says again. "And I'll see what I can do."

As she says her goodbyes and slips her phone back into her bag, she avoids meeting Angela's eyes.

"You told her you'd ask Booth to help?"

She sighs. "Yes. I mean, he's got far more access to things than I do. I can't just barge into the Hoover Building and demand they look things up for me."

Angela chuckles. "Booth does believe in barging, I admit. Sooo, you'll have to tell him."

She drops into her chair, her eyes moving to the photographs on her desk. She doesn't remember ever being sentimental before she met him – but now, her life is peppered with nostalgia. His face looks back at her, grinning through the glass in the photo next to her own more reserved smile. She remembers Zack taking the photo, in less complicated times. She doesn't think about Zack any more.

"I will tell him," she murmurs, still not looking at her friend. "I don't want him to go all… Booth-like. You know what he's like sometimes.

Angela nods and rises. "The longer you leave it, the worse he'll be. _You_ know he doesn't like being kept in the dark. Especially when it comes to you."

"Ange…" She stops, knowing her protest would be a lie to both of them. "Yes. Okay. I'll tell him."

Another nod, this time one of satisfaction, as Angela leans down to hug her. Neither says anything more, knowing that both have made compromises in the conversation. It is the way things work with them.

She takes her phone out of her bag and stares thoughtfully at the screen, half expecting it to flash with his name. She has lost count of the number of times she has rejected his call in the last few days, something she doesn't remember doing in years. Not since the early days of their partnership has she tried to avoid him, but now she delays seeing him. It isn't just what Jenny is involving her in that keeps her away. There is a new consciousness of him that insists on remaining at the forefront of her mind. She knows they have never been 'just partners', but now the concept of what they are instead is shifting away from tentative friends towards an unpredictable and mercifully unvoiced multifaceted connection. He spends more time looking at her now. She lets him. And when he slid his arm around her last week, she didn't consider pulling away until it was too late to make a difference.

She reads his last text message from last night again: _Hope you have a good time and everything okay. Have P tomorrow so won't be around._ There is nothing she can pinpoint, but she knows him too well to ignore that intangible sense of hurt. His messages are normally bright and informal and this one is simply too brief. She hasn't responded. She would have called him today, except for that last line, the one subtlety using his son as an obstacle to talking to her. Despite assuring Angela that he knows she doesn't tell him everything, she is all too aware that recently she has withheld very little from the man she admits only to herself that she relies on. He is doing the same now as she was last night, however consciously, but she was trying to keep him from being involved in something unnecessarily; to her, it seem that he is reminding her that she is outside his life.

With a shake of her head, she reminds herself not to be stupid and glances at her watch. It's almost half past three. She bites her lip, torn between staying in the office, knowing that will keep her intact, and heading over to the diner on the off-chance that maybe Booth will have taken Parker for ice cream after school. Two weeks ago she had found them there. She is still trying to ignore that encounter as the tipping point in their relationship.

The computer screen holds no appeal for her right now and even her beloved bones aren't calling for her today. She tries to tell herself that she simply needs human contact but her irritating reasonable side reminds her that Angela was here only a minute ago. As she grabs her coat and hurries through the lab, she wonders if he'll believe that she just fancied a break in the diner.

She puts her phone on the seat next to her, telling herself that work might need her, not wanting to admit that she doesn't want to miss his call. She has got too used to having him around – and wanting him around.

In the diner, the new woman is smiling cheerfully from behind the counter. She can't remember her name and she kicks herself. Booth would know it.

"Hello," she says quietly, trying to look around covertly, but already knowing that Booth's form would have stood out if he were there.

"Afternoon, honey, what can I get you?"

"Oh… I'll have a, um, iced tea." She wants to ask if he has been in, but it would feel strange.

Her drink is placed before her and she can't help it. "My partner… Tall, dark, wears a suit, comes in with me all the time. Have you seen him today?"

The other woman nods, thoughtfully. "Half hour or so ago. Popped in just to pick up a coffee, didn't stay."

"He have his son with him? He's about six, curly hair, talks a lot."

The waitress laughs. "Oh, that child can twist your brain in knots with his questions! Nice boy, though. Yes, he was with him. Said something about them going to the library."

She frowns. Library? It isn't Booth's natural habitat, so it must be for Parker. There are too many libraries in the city for her to find them, and she is briefly filled with astonished hysteria at the thought she'd even try.

"You want anything else, hon? We've got a great cherry pie."

She laughs. Booth would love that. "No thank you." As the waitress turns away, she finds herself blurting out, "I'm Temperance Brennan." She offers her hand.

The waitress takes it with a smile. "Ramona Otero. I know who you are Dr Brennan."

"Tempe… Please, call me Tempe." She says it so rarely that she feels almost nervous. In her professional circle, she never minds the formality of Dr Brennan; Angela picks a name out of a hat, it seems; and Booth… Well, Booth's nickname for her had long stuck.

Ramona nods and winks. "Nicer than Bones, honey."

She blushes. "My partner… His, um, imagination, I guess, he always calls me that. He's FBI."

"Ain't no excuse for calling a woman Bones, specially not when she's got a perfectly good name." Ramona laughs. "You imagine being called that in a moment of passion? Oh no, he's going to need a different name then."

"We're not… He's not… I mean, we aren't together." Her cheeks are burning. She can't get the idea out of her mind now. The deep resonance of his voice murmuring her name breathlessly – and she knows when he calls her Temperance she already feels a jolt in her stomach.

"Not yet you aren't, but you wait, that man never takes his puppy-dog eyes off you." Ramona is chuckling quietly now, drawing the younger woman in with her ideas of romance.

She can't allow this to happen. "No – we aren't like that. We're partners."

Ramona's raised eyebrows indicate disagreement, but she concedes easily. "Sure, honey. Whatever you say."

As she stares through the window, idly sipping her tea, she tells herself she didn't lie. They _are_ partners. They're just more than partners too. She wonders if she has pushed them in a different direction in only five days of avoidance because, although she can still explain every action rationally, the instinct she so often wants to disregard is telling her she has repair work to do.

* * *

**As always, read with no pressure if you wish, but reviews really help me know what people like! Also, they make me all warm and fuzzy, but we won't go into that...**


	3. Chapter 3

Oooh, this is hard. I had everything mapped out and then it ran away from me. Sorry to those I promised B&B would finally meet - the end of this chapter felt like a natural pause.

**Disclaimer: They aren't mine. Because if they were, they'd do as they were told...**

* * *

"Angela, hey. It's Booth."

He stops, his mouth still open. He hasn't thought this through.

"Booth? This is the part when you talk." She sounds amused, but he is sure he can hear an undertone of sympathy.

_She knows_.

He can't decide what she knows.

"Yes, um…"

"Or, y'know, we could just see if psychic communication really works."

Now he knows she is laughing.

"She's avoiding me, Angela, and you know it," he says abruptly. "So don't bother saying she's not, because when you don't answer the phone in a week, that's avoidance."

"We're really busy. She's busy. I'm sure she's tried to call."

"You're a terrible liar." He knows he doesn't need to say any more.

"Booth… She's just… Busy. I haven't seen her in a few days."

"She's not at work?!" He can hear the panic in his own voice.

"Not since Thursday. I think she took off somewhere for the weekend."

"Where? She doesn't normally. I know we don't have stuff on, but she never does this, she's always here, going on and on about how I shouldn't-"

"Babbling, sweetie," Angela cuts in. "I don't know where's she gone, but she said Thursday night she was going to help a friend out."

"We know she doesn't have friends!" he snaps, before he thinks.

Silence.

"I mean, you know what I mean, she doesn't really see them," he mutters hastily. He can imagine Angela standing in her office, wondering how best to make him feel guilty.

"I'm going to go, and you need to calm down," she says, stiffly. "If she calls, I'll tell her you rang. I won't tell her you think she's antisocial and cold-hearted with no friends."

"Angela, you know that's not what I-" He closes his mouth when he realises she's hung up on him.

Both voices in his head unite to tell him that infuriating someone's best friend is never a good way to get what you want. This time he can't use either to squash the other.

He stares at both the phones on his desk, willing them to ring. The calendar mocks him, insistently reminding him that today is Tuesday. It's now nine days since he even spoke to her. She hadn't called when she had said she would, so he had called her. He called four times last Thursday before forcing himself to admit that she wasn't going to answer.

He has lost count of the number of messages he's sent in the last week. She hasn't responded to any of them, but still his thumb moves rapidly as he tries to contain his frustration.

_Where are you? I called the lab, A says you took off somewhere last week! Call me please! Am worried._

He adds the last two words to soften what he knows is a message she will dislike. Even after three years, she still tries to stop him looking after her. He calls it protecting; she calls it monitoring.

When he receives no answering beep within five minutes, he grabs his jacket and heads out. Angela won't lie to his face.

* * *

"Booth, you can't just keep storming in here!"

She hears her boss's voice seconds before her door flies open and a haughty whirlwind fumes into the room, pursued by a calmer figure in black.

"I can't believe you can't tell me where she went!" His voice is rising in pitch and volume with every word. "You can't just let her take off like that!"

"If you just listen then-"

"Every time she does this, something ends up happening! Either she has some kind of crisis, or gets herself kidnapped or hurt or arrested or-"

"Well, maybe if you stayed calmer then she wouldn't hide things," Cam says, keeping her voice neutral.

"And if I stayed as calm as you lot seem to be, she'd always be getting into trouble!"

"Arrested?" Angela finds her voice. "Be fair, when was the last time she got arrested? And it wasn't you doing it, I mean."

He turns to her quickly, reminding her how silently he moves. "And _you!_ You know exactly where she is!"

She looks to Cam for support, but her boss is staring at the carpet, an action Angela recognises as an attempt to keep her temper. Fantastic. Nobody likes angry Booth. They like angry, frustrated, jealous Booth even less.

She knows there is little point speaking until he runs out of steam.

"I should have tagged her," he mutters, pacing. "_Then_ she wouldn't be able to disappear. Microchips! They're the answer. Just one little jab and bang! Bones on satellite tracking. Great idea."

She can't help smiling and she's sure she can see Cam's mouth twitch. Whilst nobody likes angry Booth, he can be quite amusing.

"Booth," Cam starts quietly, "I can't demand every employee gives me a detailed schedule whenever they take time off."

"Ha!" he exclaims. "Well, you should! Because this lot, ohhh, you never know."

Angela watches Cam bite her lip.

"It's called a vacation. You remember vacations? Beaches, sea, hotels, _no bodies?_ You need one!" Two sets of brown eyes lock in silent conflict.

_Fascinating_, Angela muses.

She spots the moment Booth backs down, feigning concession in the calculated hope of achieving his aim.

"Okay, okay, I'll go on vacation – once I find her." The charm smile comes out.

_He knows exactly what he's doing_.

She knows she shouldn't admire his tactics, however begrudgingly – but he's so good at manipulating when he wants to. She's seen Brennan cave too many times to dismiss his powers of persuasion, but she's rarely had them turned on her.

"Please, Angela." His voice softens. "I just want to check she's okay, you know she attracts trouble."

He's wheedling now.

"Don't you try that tone with me, Agent Hot Shot," she warns him, semi-jokingly. "I won't be won over with smiles and charm."

He sighs, temporarily studying the floor, but she can almost visualise the cogs whirring as he contemplates his next move.

"I'll leave you alone if you tell me where she is?" he suggests, hopefully, looking up at her with what she knows are deliberate puppy eyes.

"Hell, I'd tell you just to get rid of you," Cam remarks wryly.

Angela sighs, torn between loyalty to a promise and concern for her friend. "You won't go haring after her?"

He raises his eyebrows.

"I know, I know, stupid question. But could you just _tell_ me you won't?" She tries her own charm smile on him.

He looks surprised for a minute, then she sees it click. "Ohhh… I promise not to go haring after her." He winks and she's surprised by her urge to giggle.

_No wonder she keeps her barriers up. The man needs a containment field_.

"She's not gone anywhere," she hears herself say. "She's home, but she's got- Booth! No, you said… Booth!"

He's gone, and she knows she won't catch him. She isn't even sure she wants to, although Cam's rueful look reminds her of the treatment she knows she'll get from her best friend.

* * *

Traffic conspires against him, he is sure. He is certain that when he's going somewhere unpleasant, all of the city's residents stay home to ensure a clear pathway. But now, when his sense of urgency is overriding his sensible side, he is blocked at every turn. As he curses the sixth driver to cut in front of him, he hits the steering wheel hard, obscurely satisfied with the jolt of pain passing through his wrist, as if the physical discomfort will distract him from his own crazy actions. He has never worked out how she manages to find his emotional triggers, the ones he keeps masked with professionalism and sarcasm.

The route to her building is mechanical for him now, and his mind refuses to concentrate on driving, insisting that his reflexes have the job covered. The two voices in his head have spent the week warring furiously, counteracting each other at every point, both equally vehement in their own truth. He has never liked the battle between his instinct and his rationality; it has rarely ended well in the past.

Supplementary voice points out that a week is never a long time in the scheme of things. Primary voice smugly retorts that they haven't been apart for a week in three years.

She needs him. Some days, he is sure of this; other days, he has to make the effort to mentally restate their reliance on each other.

He stares up at her window, hoping to catch a glimpse of her. Two weeks ago, she waved at him from the balcony, beckoning him up. It seems like a long time ago now, that night when he thought they were finally contemplating their shifting relationship. He remembers his trepidation as he slipped his arm around her, drawing her against his side as she talked in a low but steady voice about her first foster home. He doesn't even remember how the topic came up, but it doesn't matter now. They no longer need to consciously think of things to talk about; words flow naturally, instinctively, patterning themselves against a shared history.

Three weeks ago, he watched her with his son, drawing with her spoon in Parker's ice cream, and he let his imagination off the leash. He regrets it.

As he locks the car, he wonders how long she will yell at him for. He doesn't care. He needs to see her, just for a moment, just to remind himself that they aren't two strangers who simply empathise over corpses.

Supplementary voice crosses its arms and shakes its head in despair. Primary voice pats him on the shoulder and gives an encouraging push towards a reassuringly familiar conflict.

The woman exiting the building receives his biggest smile and her shock is visible as she keeps the door ajar for him. He knows it is relief that makes him smile; he doesn't think he would have been able to get past the intercom if his target was given the option. He takes the stairs in bounds, his long strides exuding nervous energy.

His hand moves to knock on the door before he allows himself to consider the ramifications she will make him suffer.

When she answers, he is taken aback. He prides himself on always having an answer. Even he has no ready answer to the sight before him.

* * *

**Thank you to all those being patient enough to carry on reading! Hopefully my next update will be quicker. As always, no pressure to review, but I do value all comments.**


	4. Chapter 4

It's a longer chapter that might clear up a few things and hopefully intrigue - well, I have to be optimistic, anyway!

**Disclaimer: They aren't mine. Because if they were, they'd do as they were told...**

* * *

"What are you doing here?" she asks abruptly, but he hears the resignation in her voice and knows she expected him sooner or later.

"What are you _doing?!_" he blurts out, ignoring her question.

"Oh, come in…" She disappears inside, leaving him suddenly aware that his mouth is open.

Gathering his wits, he follows her, retracing his steps to close her front door as his shock fades.

"What…?" His mouth is dry. He swallows and tries again, his finger pointing accusingly. "What is _that?_"

She raises her eyebrows in what he always considers to be her what-a-stupid-question look.

"It's a baby, Booth," she says slowly, shifting said article slightly in her arms.

"She," he corrects automatically. "But… but…"

He sits down suddenly.

"Booth?"

"Yes?" He doesn't lift his head and his voice is muffled by his hands.

"You okay?"

Silence.

"No."

"Okay."

He feels her sit down next to him, the baby in her arms gurgling softly. Questions are whizzing around his mind and he desperately tries to sort them into a coherent order.

Why does she have a baby in the apartment?

"Why have you got a baby in the apartment?" he asks, before he can reconsider.

"I can't hear you when you mumble," she says wryly, and he realises he still has his head in his hands.

"Why have you got a baby in the apartment?" he repeats, lifting his head slightly but still not enough to look at her.

"Well, it's not mine."

He laughs and it sounds bitter to him. "Strangely enough, that wasn't on my list of questions."

"You've got a list?"

"Yes, I have a list- Look, that's not the point."

"Why do you need a list?"

He groans. She's doing it again. Sidetracking. "Bones! The list is… The list isn't important. Actually, there isn't a list. Just answer the question."

"It's my friend's. I'm looking after it for a bit."

"She," he mutters, unable to stop himself. "You can't keep calling her 'it'." The baby laughs, as if to agree, reaching one chubby hand towards him. He smiles, melting a little, then consciously rearranges his face into severity. No, she cannot use babies to make him forget his purpose. That ploy won't work, he assures himself.

"Fine, she. She's staying here for a while."

He opens his mouth, then closes it again, as the two voices in his head quarrel about the next question.

"Where's her mother?" He's pretty sure that's a supplementary voice question. It seems too rational to be anything else.

"Out right now. She's staying with me too. Just temporarily."

He lapses into silence for a moment.

"Booth? We done with the list?"

He finally turns to face her, knowing perfectly well that his eyes have acquired what she calls his glazed-over look. It's self-preservation, sometimes.

"There's no list. I just… Oh… Argh." He drops his head back into his hands.

"You appear to be having conceptual issues. Have you been drinking?" she asks, worriedly.

He doesn't bother repressing the loud groan. "_No_, I haven't been drinking. It's lunch time, for heaven's sake!"

"The allocation of time periods to specific activities is a construct we choose to obey," she starts, adopting her informative tone.

He wants to put his hand over her mouth, but the baby is in the way. "Shut up," he settles for, instead.

"What? 'Shut up'? Well, that's a bit… rude." She sounds surprised.

"I don't… I don't want to hear about social constructs right now, okay? Just let me, I don't know, process."

"We aren't a crime scene, Booth."

Is he imagining the hint of amusement in her tone?

He growls under his breath.

"Are you growling?"

There's definitely amusement there, he decides.

"Yes. I'm growling. And do you know why I'm growling? You! You just disappear for weeks and I have _no_ clue where you are – you don't answer your phone, you don't respond to texts – you don't go to _work_. And then I find you at home – with a baby!" His voice is rising as his frustration spills out, but he makes no effort to lower it, despite the baby's large blue eyes watching him with fascination. He jumps up, energy exuding from him, and starts pacing between her sofa and the coffee table.

"Nine days!" she retorts.

He can tell she wants to stand up and confront him. He's grateful for the baby that prevents her. That same baby appears blissfully ignorant of the tension around her and is now chewing her fist, he notices.

"Teething?" he asks suddenly.

"What?" She stares at him blankly.

"The baby," he sighs, impatiently. "Is she teething?"

"Oh… Well, yes."

"Parker did that. Chewed his fist. Well, when he wasn't crying blue murder." He smiles to himself at the memory. In a fit of despondency Rebecca had turned up on his doorstep and announced that she couldn't take any more and he would have to deal with their son for the weekend. His smile fades as he remembers her reaction when she returned to find Parker happily gnawing on wood. His reassurances that Parker preferred it to the plastic teething ring and that yes, it was intended for babies had fallen on deaf ears. He had wished he had deaf ears by the time she finished.

He's learnt a lot since then, but he still isn't convinced that wooden teething rings are a bad thing – in preference to fists, anyway.

"She must have a teething ring somewhere."

"Um, I guess." She nods her head in the direction of a large bag in the corner. "In there maybe?"

He rummages through the bag, unfazed by the multitude of baby items, triumphantly pulling his hand out holding the ring. "Yup, thought so."

The baby giggles again as he holds out the ring to her, happily consenting to chew on that rather than her fist. He knows he has a goofy smile on his face. He can't help it – he's always liked babies.

"Hello, little one," he murmurs, leaning down to stroke her cheek gently. "You're a happy soul, aren't you?"

Above his head, his partner laughs. "Softie," she accuses him.

He grins. "Sometimes," he concedes, sitting back down.

She bites her lip. "I, um, I'm sorry."

He says nothing.

"I didn't want to involve you. I wasn't deliberately shutting you out or anything-"

"You were," he interrupts, and he hears the hint of indignation return to his voice. "Otherwise you'd have answered your phone."

She sighs. "I don't know… Maybe. Look, I can cope by myself, you know. I don't need you trying to fight every battle for me."

"What have you got yourself into this time?" he asks bluntly, his voice unrelenting. "Hey, don't get me wrong, I'm just grateful you're not kidnapped, that's your usual thing."

She flinches, and he automatically puts his hand out to calm her, stopping short of contact.

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

She shakes her head. "No," she agrees, "but you do have a point."

He chuckles ruefully. "Okay, I'll let you talk. I won't interrupt, I promise. Go on."

She raises her eyebrows at him sceptically. "You, not interrupt? As much chance of that as hell freezing over."

"Oh, well done, Bones, an idiom used correctly," he teases lightly. "I'll make a human of you yet."

"That's an interruption." She pounces immediately, and he recognises the glow of triumph in her eyes. Little victories please her still. "Now, shush."

He presses his lips together, miming zipping them shut, then looks at her questioningly.

She glances down at the baby. "Sarah, this is Booth," she says, addressing the oblivious baby's head. "He's a big softie really, for all his hard act," she whispers, like they're conspirators.

He hides his fleeting surprise, reminding himself that he has seen her with babies before and should know she isn't completely inept. But he didn't expect this, this natural ease with the creature in her arms. He suppresses the warm glow that threatens to engulf him. He no longer sees the point in denying the emotions she provokes, but the effects are best controlled.

She looks up at him. "Booth, this is Sarah. Mummy's got a few problems, hasn't she, Sarah? And Auntie Tempe's helping her work them out."

He can't help the laughter that bubbles out of him. "Auntie Tempe?" he repeats, incredulously. "Auntie Tempe? You're kidding me!"

Her glare is one of those that warn of impending death or at the very least dismemberment. "Look, it's not my fault. I didn't ask for the name."

"Yeah, but you're still using it. You've gone all soft on me."

"Interruption!" she exclaims, sternly. "Shut up."

He stops talking, but can't shift the grin from his face.

"Jenny's my friend from college," she starts, shifting the baby to her other knee.

"I'll take her," he offers, reaching out.

"You're interrupting again," she points out with a laugh, but she slides Sarah across to him.

He forgets what it's like to have a baby in his lap, the way his senses instantly slip into overdrive. He knows he's protective, but this is one thing he's allowed, no, _supposed_, to protect. It seems like so long ago that Parker was this small, and sometimes he thinks wistfully of another child. Mostly, he squashes even the thought: after all, he isn't getting any younger, and the woman he wants is adamantly anti-children. Just occasionally he finds himself daydreaming – and a little girl with curly reddish brown hair features far too often for his comfort.

He runs his hand over Sarah's fine blonde hair, soothing her discomposure at the change of location. "Jenny's your friend from college?" he prompts.

She nods. "Yes… We met in our first year in a statistics class. I, um, I found it difficult." Her voice drops with the last sentence and he hides a smile, knowing she won't care for him pointing out her slight embarrassment at actually finding something academic difficult. "She didn't, and she seemed to realise I did. So we started studying together and then stayed friends when the class was over." She chuckles slightly. "I didn't take another stats class. One was quite enough. Jenny majored in business and finance though, so she had to sit through loads. I used to… I used to tease her that she spent all her time surrounding by the so-called normal distribution but she was actually surrounded by the least normal people ever."

_Ironic_, he thinks, _that you should consider other people not normal_.

He says nothing.

She goes to say something, then hesitates.

"Bones?"

She looks down, then back up at him, flashing him a weak but reassuring smile. "I met Ryan through Jenny, a bit later. He was a teaching assistant, doing a PhD in statistics. And he wanted to prove to me that statisticians were normal. He kept saying that numbers were normal, dead people were not. I'd started looking into the forensic side of anthropology by then, and, well, you know what I'm like."

He smiles at her, feeling his eyes crinkle at the edges. Yes, he knows what she's like. Even then, he knows she would have been passionate in her defence of the subject.

"It was one of those things that you're always talking about, a love-hate relationship." She pauses, fiddling with her bracelet. "But it wasn't boring." Her voice is rueful, and he wonders if she is thinking of her relationships since then, none of whom seem to have been able to hold her attention. "And maybe it was inevitable, the whole teacher-student thing, but I was a lot younger and a hell of a lot more innocent."

He likes the idea of a more innocent Temperance Brennan, one less jaded and still hoping. He has always assumed that it was her parents' abrupt departure that had dampened her spirit, but now he considers that maybe it was a slower, stealthier process that continued after that. It's easy to picture her at twenty, unconsciously beautiful and more vivacious than he has ever known her.

"And I loved him." She almost spits the words out, but her tone remains carefully even.

Loved him? His mind reels. Has he ever asked her if she has loved before? Has he just assumed she hasn't on those occasions when he has tried to explain to her the difference of that bond? He can't remember now. But he knows for sure that if he asked, she lied.

He is jealous of a man from a decade ago, and tells the churning in his stomach to stop. Carefully supported by his arm, Sarah wriggles slightly, and he absent-mindedly teases her toes, making her giggle.

He isn't sure what to say when she finally meets his eyes.

"I'm surprised you haven't interrupted again," she says, and he thinks it's almost shy, the tone she's using now.

He shrugs his shoulders, looking at the baby so he doesn't have to look at her. "I promised," he says quietly.

"It doesn't normally stop you." She smiles. "But I appreciate it," she adds, and he knows she recognises the effort he is making.

"Go on."

"You have to understand, I didn't think I was capable of it. I looked at everything so objectively. I'd never lost myself to anyone before. And it was quick, it didn't take long – we were inseparable within weeks. Jenny laughed at us, said she couldn't believe two cynics could ever prove themselves so wrong."

He wonders how this story is connected to the baby in his arms, but he knows her too well to dismiss it. She always has her reasons.

"Were you happy?" He isn't sure why he asks.

She nods, staring at her knees. "Yes." She laughs, but he hears the bitterness. "And I was so sure it couldn't last that I made sure it wouldn't."

His mouth is dry. He isn't sure what she means, but the hurt in her voice warns him that he needs to keep a tight grip on his own emotions.

"I ended it. After seven months. And he wouldn't let me." She blinks rapidly and he wonders if she will cry. "He followed me everywhere, kept insisting I was wrong. He never laid a hand on me, just made jokes and funny comments, and kept telling me there was a reason he was the one who could make me laugh."

_But that's my job_, he can't prevent his primary voice shouting silently. Sarah squeals in protest as his grip on her unconsciously tightens, and he startles, resettling her against him.

"And?" he prompts softly.

"And… And I was so sure I was right, so I just told him time and time again that it was over. I told him he knew my opinion, that monogamy wasn't the natural predilection of humans, and that I couldn't be satisfied with just him."

He feels the other man's pain, knowing the intensity of his partner's blunt words. It has taken him years to realise that anthropology is her defence, her way of fending off impulse; he knows if he had loved her he would never have been able to withstand her steady dismissal of anything emotional.

"Did he give in?"

"Of course he did," she says quietly, letting the baby catch her finger. "I knew he would. And I told myself it was right, that he would realise that what we had was a transient passion with no real basis for continuance."

_And rather than looking for the text book you'd swallowed, he thought you'd stopped loving him_, he thinks to himself. _I guess I can sympathise there_.

"I didn't see him after that for months. He used to speak to Jenny occasionally, ask how I was. Whether I was seeing someone. She'd tell me after she saw him, and I'd tell her to be truthful next time. I don't think she ever was. I think she told him I was behaving like a nun, try to make him feel better. She's like that."

She twists her finger from the baby's grasp. "Do you think she's hungry?"

He looks down, his gaze meeting sleepy blue eyes. "Tired maybe. Nap time." Without prompting, he moves carefully to the crib in the corner, laying Sarah inside and tenderly covering her with the fluffy blanket. His finger automatically strokes the baby's face as he moves away, marvelling at her sudden drowsiness.

"You're good with her."

He shrugs, slightly embarrassed. "She's a good baby."

"Jenny says she's always like that."

They are silent for a moment. He wants to prompt her to continue but fears that speaking might put her off. The collage he has built of her is shifting as he learns more of her past.

"What happened to Ryan?" he encourages when he can't stand it any longer, keeping his tone even.

"When I saw him again, he was changed. He didn't look at me. He spoke to Jenny over my head and barely acknowledged my presence. I hadn't expected that. I thought we could go back to being friends, but I forgot that we hadn't ever been friends." She pushes her hair behind her ear and he recognises the gesture as a distraction from her own words.

The key in the lock disturbs his focus and he automatically turns towards the noise.

"Tempe, you in?" a voice calls, before a tall, fair woman rounds the corner. "Oh, you are." Her attention is diverted towards the crib and she moves rapidly to check on her child. "Was she okay? Cause you any trouble?"

"She was fine," his partner says, with a sprightliness to her voice that he knows is faked. "Jen, this is Seeley Booth, my FBI partner. Booth, my friend Jenny Miller."

Jenny offers her hand with a slight smile. He notices the shadows under her eyes, the pale tint to her skin. "It's good to meet you. I assume Tempe's got you up to speed about my husband?"

He frowns. "Your husband?"

"Actually, I hadn't really said-" Temperance starts, a note of panic to her voice.

"Yes," Jenny interjects, confused. "Ryan. My husband."

* * *

**Thanks for reading! It's nice to know that people are reading and in some cases re-reading - I get all fuzzy ;-) Please review and let me know what you think - I'll duck any tomatoes... Otherwise, let us continue to pass like ships in the night.**


	5. Chapter 5

Here's how it goes the next time I think about deviating from one-shots:

**Me:** I think I'll write a multi-chapter fic this time.

**Anyone in vicinity:** That's a really bad idea, remember how slow you were with Past Futures?

**Me:** Oh yes, how right you are. One-shots it is then.

You get the gist...? ;-)

**Disclaimer: They aren't mine. I don't think I'd write any faster if they were, though...**

* * *

She doesn't remember another time that she's understood the meaning of the world spinning. There's never been anything that's made her feel quite like this, caught between Booth's stunned scrutiny and Jenny's confused stare.

"I didn't tell him," she blurts out, feeling her face colour even as she resists.

"Tempe-"

"I was just-"

"Bones, I don't get-"

She flees to her room, amazed at her own escape. Since when has she been this woman? Since when has she been someone who can't face two people she cares about?

"Bones!" she hears Booth call after her, worriedly.

But she knows the footsteps behind her are Jenny's, and that disappoints her for reasons she doesn't want to contemplate. Her friend catches her arm.

"Hey," her voice is gentle, "I don't get it."

She laughs, shakily. "That's what he was going to say."

Jenny stares at her. "Well, he doesn't get it either, then," she says softly.

"I was telling him… about me and Ryan." She is careful to use the neutral tone necessitated by memories. "And then you came in," she adds lamely, not meeting her friend's eyes.

"And then I came in," Jenny repeats slowly, glancing back over her shoulder to the living room. "How far had you got?"

* * *

His ears strain to hear their conversation, even whilst he chastises himself for eavesdropping. _No harm in dropping an eave or two_, he thinks, sniggering silently to himself at his own joke.

He glances over to the crib, the baby sleeping inside it. Was that ever what she wanted, he wonders. Was there a time when she would have allowed the possibility of a husband and a baby into her life?

He's missed it, if there was. He's ten years and however many men too late. Ten years and too much time spent cementing her defences. Ten years and too little effort to see beyond the superficial, on her part and that of the outside world.

She isn't blameless, he realises, disbelieving of his own supplementary voice's timing. There's an element of choice to this, her barricades.

Primary voice pushes supplementary out into the sunshine, forgetting that the light will only enhance it.

Now the thought is born, he can't dismiss it.

_She does this to herself, the isolation, the scepticism. She knows she's blocking anyone who gets near her._

It's not unconscious, he realises, with a sting of bitterness. There's deliberation in her actions, behind her studied distrust of people.

In three years, she has never mentioned Jenny, someone she shares more than a history with, and that hurts him.

* * *

"Not far," she admits, shaking her head. She laughs ruefully. "Certainly nowhere near you marrying Ryan. Now _that_ was a shock to him."

Jenny's face falls. "Oh… I'm sorry. I just assumed…"

"That at some point in three years I might have told my partner about two of the most important people in my life?" She stares at the floor. "Oh, you underestimate me," she remarks, dryly.

"Tempe!" Jenny hisses. "Stop that! You know I won't let you pull it on me, and I'm pretty sure he won't either."

"You've known him thirty seconds and exchanged maybe twenty words," she points out. "Nobody's instincts are that good."

"Mine are," Jenny insists, stubbornly, clearly undaunted. "Now, are you just going to leave him there?"

She lifts her head, finally meeting the light blue eyes that didn't look away. "Or do what? Jen… Ryan will turn up. He's done this before, he's just-"

"I won't take that risk!" Jenny exclaims, smothering the affirmation just short of a cry. "Don't do this to me, _don't_ belittle my knowledge of him!"

She opens her mouth to reply just as both are distracted by noise from the kitchen.

"Is that the kettle?" Jenny asks abruptly.

She nods. "And, um, the toaster."

"The toaster?"

"Yes." She hesitates. "Booth?!" she calls.

"Yes?" he shouts back.

"Are you… cooking?"

"Toasting!"

She can hear him humming as she walks towards him. "Booth, what are you doing?"

"Toasting," he repeats. "Now, I don't know what's going on with you two, but neither of you seem to be telling, and I'm starving. So make yourself useful and make the coffee."

"Booth-"

Suddenly, he's in front of her, his hand sliding up from her elbows to her shoulders. She feels the warmth and tells herself it's just body heat.

"Shush," he says, soothingly, squeezing her shoulders. "You need to eat, and I'm betting Jenny's not in much better state." He flashes that oh-so-charming smile behind her, and she feels a rise of irritation. That's her smile now. "So, how about you both just do as you're told for a few minutes, till you calm down?"

She wants to object, and she's sure Jenny will, but neither of them appear to be speaking.

"Good," he announces, turning away from her to open the fridge. "Now, you really need to shop more. I'll take you. Because you can't possibly live like this." He thrusts his hand out behind him, holding the cheese. "Jenny, slice the cheese. Bones, get on with the coffee."

She glances over her shoulder to take in Jenny's reaction, to be met by a bemused look and a semi-open mouth.

"Is he… _always_ like this?"

She nods, unable to stop the giggle. "Always. It's the alpha male in him trying to reassert his dominance in a situation he can't-"

"Bones!" His hand clamps over her mouth, his heavy watch cold against her cheek. "Anthropology is off the table for today-"

"Suddenly I like him," Jenny interjects.

"-and I don't want to hear another word on my alpha male tendencies. It's called being a _man_," he stresses.

She opens her mouth, but all she can feel is the heat of his hand against her lips. She wonders what he would do if she just pressed her lips against him. Would he know it was a kiss or just think she was fighting him?

As she contemplates, his fingers slide away, leaving her mouth cold. She tilts her head forward, her hair falling over her blush. Suddenly, making coffee seems to demand all of her focus – although she does notice that Jenny is now slicing cheese without demur. How does he do this?

She is grateful for the sudden calm that comes from the routine activity. Watching the coffee brew – something she never normally does – helps her mind settle. The logical way of thinking she so consciously adopts is escaping her now, and this disquiets her as much as the topic of the conversation.

She dreads the end of this intermission – for an intermission she knows it to be – when she will be forced to face Booth and his curiosity. She has never told him these stories of her past and she knows he will be hurt by her omissions. In truth, it has never been a deliberate deception. She doesn't know why she has never told him, other than avoidance of the reflective analysis that she doesn't want to let submerge her more pleasant memories. Sometimes, she has known for a long time, she thinks too much.

Booth's hand on her arm and the appearance of a toasted cheese sandwich before her break her from her introspection. She opens her mouth, her automatic lecture on saturated fat about to spill out, then closes it. These days, she measures her social responses by whether he would say it or not.

"Sit," he instructs, pushing her towards the sofa.

She obeys, once more wondering why she is so unchallenging of his dominance today. It's almost as if she can only control one strand of her life at a time and today belongs to the past.

Booth crunches his sandwich, watching her. She knows Jenny is watching her too, more subtly. If she doesn't speak, Jenny will. She isn't sure which she prefers.

"We should probably tell you about Ryan," she mumbles, immediately taking a bite so that she isn't forced to follow up.

Booth nods slowly. "You were telling me – earlier…" He trails off. "Look, there's no point me dithering around the subject. You split up with Ryan, but he ended up with Jenny. Fill in the gaps."

* * *

He isn't oblivious to the look that slides between the two women. He knows he is risking a shutdown from both of them, but something tells him that forthrightness might work where discretion has not. His need to understand – to allow the story to form in his mind as a whole, not as a series of gaps – is overriding his normal approach of allowing the narrative to form organically, unforced by his prompting.

"Go on, Tempe," Jenny murmurs, an unspoken exhortation in her tone.

Hearing his partner called a name he rarely hears is strange for him, but he likes it. He likes the idea of her separate identities finally meeting. One day, he thinks, maybe he will be able to drop the distance he created when he gave her a nickname verging on the ridiculous. He thinks of her as Temperance when he wants to feel close to her.

Now, she bites her lip, again letting her hair fall forward as he had noticed her do in the kitchen. He has rarely seen her embarrassed or shy before and it unnerves him.

"It's hard… Hard to explain, I mean. It's no-one's fault," she adds hastily, looking at Jenny as though she needs to apologise for an accusation that hasn't been made. "I tried to be friends with Ryan, but he said he couldn't just go along with that. He told me that I'd… That I'd made my choice and he hoped that one day he would agree with it. So I left him alone. He wanted it, so I left him alone."

"You had to," Jenny interrupts, gently. "It wasn't doing either of you any good, forcing it."

Temperance nods, breathing in slowly before continuing. "I wanted to know how he was doing. I couldn't seem to break away, I always liked hearing about him. So I used to get Jenny to see if she could intercept him – she was just doing me a favour – and I suppose, well…"

"We didn't intend anything to happen."

This time, Jenny's interruption is remorseful, maybe even ashamed, he thinks. The words he has heard so often before, and always doubted the truth behind, are now spoken with quiet sincerity. He knows too well that some feelings can't be controlled.

"Jen… It doesn't matter now. Ryan and I were never going to be together again, I had burnt every bridge going."

The bell in Booth's head dings at his partner's use of the idiom. He wonders how many she has picked up from him.

"I used to bump into him so much, I think he wondered what I was playing at." It seems natural for Jenny to pick up the story now. "To be honest, I'm not sure what I was doing. I kept telling myself I was doing it for Tempe, but I knew I wasn't really. If I had been, I'd have just managed a quick chat a couple of times a week. But then I started seeing him nearly every day, deliberately looking in all the places I knew he'd be. You'll think I always wanted him for myself – everyone did then. I didn't. When he was with Tempe, I always thought he was a bit too serious, actually." She laughs, ruefully. "I'd introduced them, and everyone used to ask me whether I didn't think she was serious enough already, without adding him to the mix. But then I started to see a different side of him, the jokey side she had always talked about. And he was… _Different_, is the only way I can put it. It's such a cliché, but he made me feel special." She pauses, her eyes darting briefly towards Booth in silent appeal. "We didn't intend anything to happen," she repeats.

He tries to hold her gaze, to let her know that he understands. He isn't sure she notices.

"There's more, obviously," she continues, "but as we don't want to be here for hours, I guess the summary is that we graduated, Tempe went on to graduate school, Ryan got his PhD and I got my first accounting job whilst I was doing my masters part time. I'd done an internship with the state legislature in Maryland and they took me on. We used to joke that I'd be the one to bring down the government." She looks at her friend, a secretive smile at a shared jest passing between them. "We didn't lose touch – not altogether – but we drifted. I suppose it was inevitable – I moved further away, then Ryan got an assistant professorship nearer me, so I wasn't travelling back to see him." She takes a deep breath. "When he asked me to marry him, I called Tempe, but…"

"I'd moved," the subject remarks wryly. "And I changed my cell number so often… It would have taken months to find me, I think I was abroad."

"Or in the lab," Jenny teases gently.

"Nothing's changed there," Booth remarks, flashing a smile at his partner to counteract the rebuke of his words. She laughs slightly – the first sign of the cloud lifting from her, he hopes.

"I bet," Jenny agrees, chuckling. "Well, we got back in touch eventually – a couple of years ago?" She looks to Temperance for confirmation.

"Yes," she agrees. "You emailed my publisher, she thought you were some crazy fan, remember?"

Jenny laughs, the first genuine delight he has seen in her. "Oh yes! I got a standard reply saying that unfortunately Dr Brennan couldn't meet all her fans – so I emailed back to say again that I really wasn't some nut, I was honestly Tempe's college friend. Had to give a few snippets I didn't think anyone else would know to prove it." She winks at her friend. "I could have chosen worse."

Booth hesitates. "I've got to ask – I'm here because Ryan's missing, yes?"

Jenny's eyes fall instantly. "Yes," she whispers.

"I don't understand – why? Has he done this before?"

Jenny's eyes dart around the room. "He's, um, sometimes he can't cope with it all. He's bipolar. Diagnosed a few years ago now. And mostly he deals with it. _We _deal with it. I get told not to describe it as mild, but to me it seems it. He spends so long being _normal_ – another word I get told not to use – that I forget what he can be like."

"He's not… Dangerous?" Booth queries, carefully, worried about disturbing the air of truth-telling they have created.

Jenny shakes her head. "No. He's never been violent, not towards me or Sarah or anyone else. He takes himself out of circulation."

"We never recognised it for what it was," his partner adds, softly. "Maybe we weren't looking. I know he wasn't as bad when we were younger, but then I didn't spend all week with him. Maybe after… Stressful events seem to trigger _something_. And when Sarah was born…"

Jenny looks at him, pleadingly. "Children are stressful. Sarah's a good baby, she always has been, but she, I don't know, tapped into something in Ryan. We talked so long about a baby, about whether we could take that risk, and he was adamant it was something he wanted."

Booth watches Temperance move to sit beside her friend. She slips her arm around Jenny almost as though this is something she does every day, and he thinks again how different she can be when she is removed from her present.

"He wanted her," Temperance says quietly. "You know he did. Just because something has happened now doesn't mean he loves either of you less."

Booth leans back in his chair. Sometimes, she leaves him speechless. And it is those times when he wonders why he still expects less of her, given what he has seen in her before.

* * *

"Will you try?" she asks at the door, still aware of a vague reluctance to ask for his help.

He nods without hesitance, reaffirming her faith in him. "Of course."

"I'm…" She takes a deep breath. "I'm sorry. For not telling you before. It's not that I didn't want you to know."

He steps closer to him, his hand reaching out to push her hair back from her face. "What did you think I would do?"

She shrugs, her eyes silently asking him not to push this. "I don't know. Honestly. I didn't… I didn't want to talk about Ryan. And when people meet Jenny, I have to."

"Okay," he concedes, although he knows instinctively that there is more behind her silence than she is willing to admit. "I'll see what I can do. He might have come up on the radar somewhere."

He turns away, but at the last minute, he knows he can't leave it like this. In two short steps, his arms are wrapped around her, her gasp of surprise muffled as she lands against his chest.

"You don't keep these things from me, you hear me?" he mutters, fiercely. "I'm the first person you can come to for help. You _know_ that."

She doesn't pull away and he isn't sure what that means any more.

"I know," she mumbles. "I just don't think you should have to deal with everything."

He prises himself away from her, holding her at arm's length as he uses one hand to tilt her chin upwards. "You need to think about what you want. Not just from me," he says steadily, his strong hand keeping her looking at him. "Now, for the moment, you just look after Jenny. And yourself. But don't forget, you aren't on your own any more. You haven't been for a long time."

"Booth… You can't just take on everything that happens to me."

He chuckles. "Yes, I can. And you know why?"

She stares at him, and he knows she is half-scared of the answer. "Why?" she asks, shakily.

"Because two weeks ago, I kissed you. And you didn't stop me. When this is over, I want you to think about that. And then you'll know why maybe I get to be involved in things that happen to you."

* * *

**Sorry about all the exposition. I promise more action in the next chapter! I love reviews, but hate the pressure for people to leave them - I promised myself I'd never hold people hostage for them... So as usual, review if you want to, pass on without guilt if you just want to read!**


	6. Chapter 6

**I'm on a roll here - two posts in two days...**

**This feels like a "filler" chapter to me, but it seemed necessary to fill in a couple of gaps in the timeline.**

* * *

_Three weeks ago…_

She hears his semi-exasperated tone as she raises her head to notice him.

"Could you just… Look, just stop pushing the fruit around and eat it, will you?" her partner grouses, dropping his head into one hand.

She smothers her laugh as she made her way to the counter, ordering on autopilot without really looking at the person serving.

"Sure thing, honey. Where you going to sit, I'll bring it over?" The cheerful voice of the new waitress cuts into her thoughts.

"Oh – over there," she replies, gesturing towards the pair locked in mock-battle.

Parker notices her first and waves happily with his spoon as he calls a greeting. Booth is slower to react, turning to see her before his smile breaks out.

"Hey Bones – you left early?"

She nods. "I was done."

She decides not to mention the stray thought in the back of her mind that reminded her he was picking up Parker after school – and added their shared love of ice cream to conclude their likely presence in the diner.

"No pie?" She inclines her head towards his empty bowl.

He laughs. "No – banana split day. At least it would be if Parker _ate his banana_," he grinds out, aiming a mild glare at his son.

Parker takes no notice and carefully eases another spoonful of ice cream away from the banana. She suppresses a smile and slips into the seat next to the boy.

"Not a fan of fruit?" she asks him, neutrally.

Parker shrugs. "S'okay. But it spoils the ice cream."

"Oh, okay. So you'll eat it afterwards?"

He nods, then gestures for her to lean down so he can whisper. "It's funny when Dad gets mad sometimes," he confides, in a voice nowhere near the level of a whisper.

"Parker!" Booth deplores, shaking his head into his hands. "We talked about the whole making-Dad-mad-on-purpose thing, didn't we?"

Parker seems to know his father isn't really annoyed and just smiles benignly. She wonders – not for the first time – how her partner separates his personas so easily. His son is untouched by the ambiguities they see too often.

"Here's your food." The waitress slides a cup of coffee and plate in front of her with a smile.

She watches Booth's eyebrows shoot up as she thanks the woman.

"You don't even like pie," he informs her, almost accusatorily.

She sighs in despair. "Booth, you know perfectly well it's cobbler and not pie. And be quiet, I got you a spoon."

She catalogues his expression as it runs from the urge to win an argument to the desire to steal her food. When he picks up the spoon, she knows she is grinning.

"Can I try it?" Parker interrupts her minor triumph.

"No," his father replies hastily, "people who don't eat their bananas don't get to try other people's food. It's a, um, rule."

She opens her mouth to question him but shuts it at his warning stare.

"Daaad," Parker protests.

She uses her spoon to draw a smiley face in Parker's fast-melting ice cream, making him giggle and his father roll his eyes despairingly. "How about you finish the banana and I'll save you a spoonful?" she offers, ducking her head and murmuring conspiratorially.

It's Booth's turn to open his mouth to protest this time; he too thinks better of it, as he watches Parker smother a bite of banana in ice cream and swallow it hastily.

She raises her eyebrows at her partner. "See?" she says merrily. "He's just the same as you."

"What?! No… Bones, don't say things like that," he objects. "I'm not that easy to bribe."

She laughs. "Oh, you are – it only took the promise of chocolate to make you go all the way to Angela's office to get my file, remember?"

He opens his mouth for the second time, only to realise he has no good response, and settles instead for stealing more of her food. His eyes dart to the child next to her, engrossed in his bowl, before he leans in closer.

"Did you identify your skeleton?" he murmurs, keeping his voice low enough for Parker not to hear.

She nods. "Yes – we were right."

"Want me to talk to the family?"

She shakes her head. "Not your case, Booth," she reminds him. They had known it was a suicide from the start. "Let someone else take the burden for once."

His eyes drop briefly and she knows he is contemplating a family missing their son, who will never know if they could have helped him.

"I just think… He was, what, twenty? Somebody could have helped him." He licks fruit residue from his spoon, deep in thought.

Her instinct is to tell him about biological imbalances and the science behind depression, but she knows better these days. "Sometimes we can only hope people seek the help," she reminds him.

"Finished!" a gleeful exclamation comes from next to her.

She glances at Parker's scraped-clean bowl and pushes her plate, with its remaining spoonful, over to him. "Go for it," she tells him, watching as he uses his spoon to split it into two more manageable sections.

"You don't like cooked fruit," Booth says suddenly, as if he has just reached a startling conclusion.

She sighs. "Well, I fancied it for once. And it's peach cobbler – I really don't like cooked apples."

"Ohhh no, admit it – I'm converting you," he teases. "Next thing you know, it'll be pie. Then you'll start wanting it for every meal. And before you know it, you'll be a pie addict, and I'll have to take you to Pie-eaters Anonymous all the time."

She frowns. "I don't think pie-eating is a life-threatening condition requiring an anonymous, non-judgemental circle of support, Booth. Although, I suppose if you ate a lot of pie and it became the root cause of any number of potential health problems-"

His laugh cuts her short. "Nobody else I know could possibly think so much about the possibility of a support group for pie-eaters," he points out, but his smile is wide and she knows he is only mocking her gently.

She smiles in return, her day suddenly looking a little brighter. She hasn't seen him in three days and she's finding these days that the voice on the end of the phone isn't always enough for her. It isn't right, she knows, that she is starting to rely on his presence.

Yesterday, she had called him just to say hello and it scared her that she didn't even try to think of an excuse and he never asked for one. Instead he had talked without the spectre of an investigation hanging over them and she had fallen into the realisation that _this_ was the man everyone else met, the one who oozed charm and humour and could effortlessly draw anybody into conversation. This was the man every other woman saw without having to peel away his professionalism, his sarcasm and that dark past he hates but can't escape.

"Dad, can we go and play in the museum?"

Parker interrupts her musing and she is grateful to him. The majority of her thoughts concern her these days, particularly when they stray to her partner.

"Play in the museum?" Booth repeats, puzzled.

She hesitates. "Um, Hodgins may have – demonstrated? – a few things when you left Parker with him last month," she says neutrally.

Booth's groan is muffled as his head drops into his hands. "Diheblothigsup?" comes the barely audible question.

"It was less a question of blowing things up than melting them," she admits, sheepishly.

"Melting things. Good." He lifts his head slightly. "Is that better or worse than blowing things up? Because I'm really not sure."

"Well, it obviously depends on the substances in question," she starts, only to stop abruptly when she notices his expression. "Better. Less messy," she adds hastily. "Less potential for, um, bodily harm."

He leans back in his chair, his head falling backwards. She watches him roll his shoulders and knows he is stiff. Last month she told him he needed a new bed; he clearly hasn't taken her advice.

"No, we can't go and play in the museum," he exhales long-sufferingly.

"Dad-"

"No, Parker," he repeats more firmly. She rarely sees his inner disciplinarian emerge from the air of paternal tolerance that cloaks him when he is around his son. "For a start, Dr Hodgins causes quite enough damage on his own."

Parker sighs, but doesn't argue. She is surprised – she expected dissent from the boy. Maybe she should take more notice of Booth's parenting methods.

Her partner rises, waving at the waitress to get her attention. "Thanks Ramona," he says, handing her the money.

"No problem," she replies cheerfully, patting Parker on the shoulder as he scrambles past Brennan to reach his father. "Take care, you two."

"We will," Parker assures her with a grin. "Bye, Dr Brennan!"

She smiles, rising to her feet. "Bye Parker," she says quietly.

She is surprised by his arms sliding round her waist, but she knows he's an affectionate child and automatically returns his hug. Booth grins at her, perfectly aware that she is taken aback, and she glares at him mildly.

"I'll see you tomorrow?" he checks, raising his eyebrows.

"Yes. Lunch," she agrees, remembering they had set it up yesterday, when she had hoped to resist seeking him out today. "Come by the office whenever you want."

He nods. "Will do – it takes ten minutes to get you out the door," he teases, winking cheekily.

She doesn't try to hold back her smile. "Shush," she chides gently, pushing him in the direction of the door as she heads to the counter to pay the waitress.

"Never," he calls over his shoulder as he hustles Parker through the door.

She's sure she can still hear him laughing, even through the glass, and it makes her smile widen.

As she accepts the money, Ramona smothers her own grin. She likes this pair and was stunned when one of the others told her they were professional partners, not a couple. Well, no matter the detail, she thinks to herself, they're far closer than any partners should be.

* * *

**As usual, I don't demand reviews, although of course every one is appreciated - read and enjoy(?) without pressure if you wish!**

**(So - has everybody forgiven me for ending 'Rekindling' like that? It doesn't seem like they have from the reviews, so I'm having to reconsider a third chapter in the hope of pacifying the projectile-throwers...)**


	7. Chapter 7

**So, for those of you with any concept of what has gone before, here is Chapter 7. I've been gone a while - and I admit this chapter's been a real struggle. I had to read all my previous chapters carefully just to remember what had happened! Hopefully I'm back into it a bit now. Any mistakes are mine and are born from a desperation to get the chapter published before I tinker with it for eternity...**

**This is the final 'retrospective' chapter - the next one gets us back in the full flow of the story. Thank you to those of you with the patience to wait for me to get my act together!**

* * *

_Two weeks ago…_

From the lights in the window, he knows she's still awake. She turns off all the lights methodically just before going to bed; he's watched her do it before, on those occasions when secretive protection has been all he was able to provide.

It's been a tough day for both of them, but he isn't sure that's enough to excuse his presence here at a time when darkness dominates any thought of sun. He's fleetingly sad to acknowledge that there are still boundaries between them. They are not as close as everyone assumes. Sometimes, they seem it; sometimes they read each other well enough to complete the other's thoughts, not just sentences. But then there are those other times, times he prefers to overlook, when they are so out of sync it's like they're meeting for the first time.

He turns off the engine and sits for a moment, staring at her window. He has no excuse for being here: no case file, no takeout, no death threat that glues him to her side. It shocks him to realise that he still looks for an excuse; surely he can just drop in with a _Hey Bones, just fancied some company_? Would she really look so dimly on that? She has a human side after all, no matter how little she lets it be seen.

The doorman recognises him, greeting him with a smile. "Mr Booth. She's home, go right on up."

_Mr Booth_. Sometimes he likes it, being plain old Mr Booth, not Special Agent Booth. There's less pressure, but more humanity. It makes him feel more like a man who is allowed to worry about a woman's reception.

"Thank you, Mr Carver." He never calls him Henry: if he is Mr Booth, then the doorman is Mr Carver. Reciprocal politeness, he hears his mother remind him.

This morning, they identified the three skeletons discovered two days ago as three friends who went missing ten years ago. He had never expected a different outcome, so it surprises him to realise that his denial is still capable of reaching a level at which an almost certainty turning out to be true retains the bitter sting inherent in bad news that is his to tell. He never puts it off, never tries to pass on the responsibility of breaking it to families, but it isn't because he's got used to it. It's because it reminds him to value what he has, however clichéd that may seem.

So he sat in front of three sets of parents in turn, forcing himself to meet their eyes, praying he would be able to forget the image of hope dying behind blue and brown. Now he can't shake off that memory of faces frozen in final confirmation of something they had never wanted to face. He doubts they'll find the killer – something about this one feels stale to him, as though every lead will end in frustration.

His partner told him not to give up; that his instincts had been wrong before. He could tell she didn't believe her own words. Even she could feel the stagnation pervading their initial enquiries. The first investigation had been thorough, every lead followed, every suspect eliminated. He couldn't find a single error in the pages of notes and interviews.

He's waiting for the elevator when the sudden sadness overwhelms him and he turns back towards the outer door. He doesn't want to inflict this on Bones, not tonight. He wants company, but he doesn't want to talk about the case, and he knows her logical mind will work away at it until she can satisfactorily file it in her mind.

The doorman looks up in surprise. "Not staying…? Do you want me to give her a message?"

He hesitates, but shakes his head. "No, thank you. It's late, I won't bother her."

As he makes his way back to his car, he wonders when she became the only person he goes to. He used to have other friends who were more than capable of dealing with highs and lows of his life. They're still there, his other friends, but somehow everybody has been overshadowed by the intensity of his relationship with his partner.

He's opening the car door when the phone rings.

"Hey Bones," he answers, trying to keep his voice bright.

"Turn around," she instructs.

He does as he is told, automatically looking up to her apartment. She is standing on the balcony, waving at him; it's too far away to see her expression, but he can tell from her voice she is smiling.

"Running away from me, Booth?" she asks chidingly.

"No..! I mean – no, I was just… I wasn't going to bother you," he finishes, lamely.

"You're not bothering me. Come on up."

"Bones, it's late."

"Do I look like I'm asleep?"

He pauses. "Okay. See you in a minute."

This time he doesn't speak to Mr Carver, just exchanges wry smiles as he heads back towards the elevator. He stops his foot tapping as the floors go by, unsure of where this nervous energy has come from.

She is waiting at her door. When he last saw her, three hours ago, she had been shrouded in her work clothes; now, she is dressed far more casually in jeans and a t-shirt, her feet bare, her hair loose. This is the way he prefers her, without the barriers and the all-pervading air of despair that they haven't been able to shake off today.

"Hey," she smiles, stepping aside to let him in. "I can't believe you came all the way here and weren't going to come in."

He smiles ruefully. "Seemed like a good idea at the time."

She laughs, leading the way to the kitchen. From the fridge she takes a carton of juice and a covered bowl. "Have you eaten?" she asks mildly.

He nods quickly. "Yes, just after I left work."

She raises her eyebrows. "Don't believe you." The bowl goes in the microwave, juice in a glass that somehow ends up in his hand.

"Bones-"

She glares at him and he stops, taking a gulp of his juice.

"You were writing," he says, spotting the glint of black on iridescent coming from her laptop.

She smiles wryly. "Unsuccessfully. Much as I hate to admit it, I have hit a stumbling block."

He feigns surprise. "The great Dr Brennan? But I thought she didn't believe in the concept of writer's block, undercut as it is with ill-discipline and the search for easy diversion?"

She doesn't question his quoting of her and even allows a concessionary smile. "I must learn not to say things that make it into your catalogue of my assertions. And I said _stumbling_ block, not writer's block."

She sticks her tongue out, making him laugh, his heart lifting at the childish gesture.

"Very mature, Bones," he teases.

Even he is surprised by her answering wink. "I do try," she deadpans.

The microwave pings and she reaches for the oven gloves. He is suddenly hit by hunger as the spicy smell wafts towards him; he hasn't felt much like eating in a couple of days. In a flash, he remembers why, the desolate faces of six parents shivering at the periphery of his closed eyes.

"We aren't going to find this one," he says quietly, forcing his eyes open to the bright lights of her kitchen.

She wraps the steaming bowl in a tea towel and pushes it into his hands. "Potato and lentil curry. Careful, it's hot." She picks his glass up off the counter and turns to the fridge to refill it. "You can't say that yet, Booth. We've caught the perpetrators of older crimes than this. Go and sit down."

He follows the threads of her conversation without problem, even abiding by her temperature warning. Staring disconsolately at the juice glass she places in front of him as he drops onto her couch, he mutters, "I could do with a drink."

She doesn't pretend to misunderstand him. "If you drink, you'll feel worse by midnight, plus you'll gripe about having to leave your car here," she says mildly. "You'll feel better when you've eaten something. And no whining about the lack of meat."

He chuckles slightly. "Promise," he says, taking the spoon she offers.

He's not sure whether it's the food or the company, but he can feel his spirits slowly rising. It's not some magical effect she has on him – that would sound far too Mills and Boon for their reality – but it _is_ the knowledge that he has someone prepared not just to listen but to understand.

She waits to speak until his bowl is half empty. "Did you see all the parents?" she asks softly.

He nods. "The Priors were the worst."

She reaches over to pat his hand. "Separately?"

"They insisted. They couldn't even sit in the same room together to learn their daughter was dead." He sighs, swirling his spoon in his remaining curry before a coaxing nod from her makes him take another mouthful. "What next? Two funerals, so they don't have to bury Hayley together?"

He knows she will see through his flippancy to the painful disbelief he is masking. Hayley Prior's parents had tested his patience to its limit, to the extent that he was concerned he would lose the world of feeling he had for them.

He shakes his head. "I don't understand them, Bones. They're the only two people who know what the other is going through. But all they do is battle each other on every point." He remembers the spite thrown across the room on the one occasion they had crossed paths and feels his face drop. "They could help each other, but they just find endless reasons to hurt each other."

"You were the one who called it their defence mechanism," she reminds him. "And Sweets agreed with you, remember. You both told me they couldn't face admitting Hayley wasn't coming back, so they constructed anger to deflect it."

"I know." He stares at the ceiling. "But what if they never face it? Can you imagine that, if they have to go on feeling like this?"

She hesitates. "You can't fix them," she says gently, taking his empty bowl from him and setting it on the table.

He recognises the sadness in her voice as his own reflected frustration. "Someone should," he says quietly, dropping his eyes to meet hers.

"But not you," she reinforces. "Somebody will, eventually. But we will move on to the next case, the next people we can help."

He laughs under his breath. "I thought you'd tell me that people need to accept the transience of life."

She shrugs her shoulders. "I accept death and I know that my life continues when people I care about die. Acceptance doesn't stop it hurting." She stands up and takes a piece of paper off a shelf. "I need to cheer you up. Look what Russ forwarded to me."

He takes the offered sheet and can't help the smile. It's the girls he always calls her almost-nieces, caught mid-fight and red-faced, an object he doesn't recognise held tight in four determined hands.

"Amy emailed it to him," she says, sitting back down. "He thought I'd like it. He says I used to fight like that with him, but we weren't exactly evenly matched."

"He always won?"

"Always." She laughs. "And mostly he didn't even want whatever it was we were fighting over."

He grins. "Me and Jared fought all the time. We never cared what it was about."

"No change there, then," she teases, stretching her legs out in front of her.

"Nope, none at all," he concedes, without bitterness. "Just that now we tend not to be quite as physical. Usually," he adds, seeing her raised eyebrows. "Hey, come on, he's my brother. Sometimes it's called for." He settles back against the corner of her sofa, turning towards her slightly. "I bet you missed it, when he left. The fighting, I mean."

She lets her head fall sideways against the back of the sofa as she contemplates. "It was… Monotonous. A lot of things were, after that. And those that weren't, I prefer not to think about."

He squeezes her arm instinctively, recognising that he had unwittingly dredged up bad memories.

"It wasn't all bad," she reassures him.

He isn't convinced; she's let enough slip over the last few years for him to see through her bravado. She is as closed as she is for a reason, he knows.

"What was good, then?" he challenges, not aggressively.

She shrugs. "School was good. Academically, at least."

"It would have been good regardless," he counters. "Being fostered wasn't what made you clever."

She fiddles with a loose thread on a cushion. "When Russ first left… I didn't want to talk about it. It was that old cliché you're always talking about, that talking makes things real. I wasn't able to realise then that you should work through things logically rather than letting emotion overrule you."

"You were _fifteen_," he interjects, astonished.

"I might have been fifteen – but I still didn't like not feeling in control of myself. And academic work made me concentrate, it realigned my thought processes." She hesitates. "Sometimes I think maybe my life would be different if I hadn't spent so much time working." She smiles wryly. "I'm not the most well-rounded person, after all."

He chuckles. "More so than you were. And I'm taking all the credit."

"You deserve it," she murmurs softly, unable to duck her head fast enough for him to miss her blush.

"Aww, Bones," he croons, clearly delighted, "don't say too many nice things, I'll think you're ill."

She slaps his arm, her face still rosy. "Shut up."

On impulse, he catches her hand and pulls her towards him until she lands inelegantly against his chest with a surprised exhalation. He laughs at her stunned expression and this feels so natural, so easy, that he's alarmed. When did this closeness become devoid of the tension that touch had always brought them?

"Booth?" she whispers nervously, and he looks down to see the question in her eyes; the question he knows she isn't ready to ask and he isn't ready to answer.

He strokes her hair back from her face, the brush of his fingers against her lashes making her eyes glide shut. When she's like this – when she can't see him and he doesn't have to admit their reality into the cocoon of their partnership – it is like the proverbial light switching on in his head. Except this light is bright enough to blind him to everything around them rather than illuminate.

He knows he's going to kiss her seconds before he lowers his head and he suspects she knows too, from the quickening of her breathing and the stubborn refusal to open her eyes. He has every chance to resist, to simply wrap her in his arms for an embrace that would hide so much, but this time he chooses not to. This time, he chooses to give in and kiss her, unhurried, unpressured, unwatched.

It isn't the perfect, calm, smoothly-executed kiss he has thought about too often for his liking. Her lips are dry, his heart is beating too fast for him to focus on her the way he has always promised himself he would, they're both verging on frantic in their eagerness. His fingers get caught in her hair, she catches her hand awkwardly on his shoulder and he's sure he hears a giggle as their teeth momentarily clash. But even the gracelessness feels _right_ and it certainly isn't a reason to stop.

His hands span her back, like he is scared she will break away, as he manoeuvres himself down onto the cushions, warm curves nestled against him. Her tongue tentatively plays with his and he doesn't hold back the moan, intensifying the press of his lips against hers, determined to make her turn to jelly against him.

She wriggles slightly and he is forced to let their surroundings back in, even as every impulse in his body launches an astonished outcry.

"Mmph," she protests, resisting his attempts to separate them.

He turns his head, her lips shifting to nuzzle his jaw. He can't face her right now, as his mind whirrs with options for speech, none of which strike him as appropriate. Instead, he allows silence to remain, waiting for his heartbeat to slow and dreading her delayed reaction.

When he feels her start to sit up, he knows he has to speak before she does or she won't ever allow him to mention it. He presses his fingers gently to her warm, swollen lips, wondering if she can still taste him the way she has lingered in his senses.

Her eyes sparkle with equal measures of thrill and trepidation and his overriding thought is that he wants to see her like this again, without any degree of apprehension to hold her back.

"We won't analyse this," he breathes, letting his forehead fall forward against hers. "Don't try. We won't talk about it, not till you're ready to."

He forces himself to stand, leaving her staring at him with a scarcity of words he has never known her possess before. When he presses his lips to her cheek, he is sure he feels her tremble slightly before he immediately tells his imagination to behave.

"I'll leave now." He tilts her chin with his fingers so she can't look away. "Promise me you won't analyse this."

"I can't," she breathes honestly. "I know I won't be able to help myself."

He doesn't stop himself smiling. "Well then," he replies, leaning close to her ear, "just don't convince yourself I didn't know exactly what I was doing and exactly what I wanted."

His departure is swift, the ding of the elevator sounding through her mind before she has roused herself from the haze he has provoked.

_Don't analyse it?_ she thinks to herself.

_How can I not?_

* * *

**You know the drill by now - read freely and without pressure, but please know that all reviews are read, re-read and treasured (and, I admit, used as a morale boost when inspiration is lacking). I'm sorry to my more recent reviewers who haven't received a reply. Some make me smile all day!**


	8. Chapter 8

**Firstly, an apology to all those poor people forced to re-read the entire story every time I post - and I mean it, I really am sorry!**

**Secondly, there is a lot of exposition in this chapter, which I apologise for to all those people who will think the B/B interaction is light (and they're right) - I felt like I had to do it for the story. I should remember that I write better without a plot...**

**Finally, I've had to do a (low) level of medical research for this chapter - any errors are my own and unintended. I'm not medically qualified (I laugh at the very thought!) so I claim no expertise.**

* * *

"Miller. As in Arthur. First names Ryan William." He taps his pen on his desk. He's rarely patient. "What? No… Arthur Miller. You know, the playwright… How can you not have heard of him? … Look, it's Miller, as in he who grinds wheat to make flour. Got it…? Yes, I'll hold." He covers the receiver. "Do you know how many Ryan Millers there are, even if we just limit it to DC, Virginia and Maryland? Thousands."

"You've got his social security number," she reminds him, mildly.

"Which would be great, if he was in a hospital or had been arrested. Neither of which seems likely, from what you say… Yes? … You don't? … Okay, it was a long shot. Thanks anyway." He replaces the receiver and scores through a line on his notepad. "Heard from Jenny?"

She shakes her head. "Nothing. She'd have called if she found him."

He sighs, dropping his head into one hand as he contemplates the list in front of him. "I'm nearly out of options." He hesitates, biting his lip. "Did you try the morgue again?"

She knows he is trying to keep his tone neutral, to treat this like he would any other case. She needs him to: as long as he does, she feels like she won't break. "Yes. Nothing, and no John Does anywhere near Ryan's description." The words feel wrong, as if she is somehow disloyal for even thinking them.

He seems to read her mind and that feels even more wrong. "We have to check. Just in case." He inclines his head towards the corner of the room. "I'm surprised she's left Sarah with us and not family."

She hesitates, wondering how much to tell him. "Jenny's parents live in Michigan. They're nice people, they like Ryan, but they didn't think they should have a baby. Jenny doesn't see them much." She twists her bracelet on her wrist, watching it catch the reflection of his monitor. "She hasn't told Ryan's family. I think… She's hoping he's back before she'll have to. They live out in California, near San Diego I think – moved there last year just after Sarah was born. I think his sister's still in New Jersey. They – Ryan and Jenny – they had to persuade his parents to move. His dad's been ill and I think he wanted to go back to where he grew up." She tries to control her voice, willing it not to be the push that cascades the dominos. "I met them… Several times."

"She should tell them," he says gently.

She lifts her hands in a despairing gesture. "You think I haven't told her that?"

He looks at her directly. "I don't know, Bones. This is all new to me; I have no idea how react to her." Before she can speak, he cringes. "No – I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that. That makes it sounds like you should have told me about her and of course you didn't need to."

Didn't she? She isn't sure any more. It seems as if the closeness she has both treasured and worried about building between them is now threatened by the mere existence of her old friend. Yet it had seemed natural not to tell Booth about Jenny; it had barely been an active avoidance. She realises with a shock that she has somehow separated her life into two eras: pre-Booth and since meeting Booth.

For a hastily discarded second, she allows the prospect of a _post_-Booth era to force its way into her consciousness. The slow tremble of dread slips through her, both unexpected and yet somehow appropriate. Will there be a day when he is no longer in her life?

She knows his patience isn't limitless; nobody's is. She knows she's tested him on occasion.

She knows he is still waiting for her to resolve a kiss that happened two weeks ago and she isn't sure she can.

"I should have told you about her," she says quietly, more to break her own thoughts that to reassure him. "It's insulting to both of you that I didn't."

He frowns. "I understand why you didn't, you know. What happened with Ryan can't be easy to talk about."

She wonders whether to tell him the truth for too many seconds. "I was ashamed," she admits, her voice barely more than a whisper. "I didn't want you to know."

His frown deepens. "We all have skeletons of past relationships in our closets. You're met most of mine." He grins, clearly trying to elicit a smile from her. His face falls as he fails. "Hey, come on. I think I can beat a messed-up relationship when you weren't even through college with a proposal to a woman who didn't love me after I knocked her up, don't you?"

She amazes herself by instantly seeing through his forced jocularity. "You still feel that," she says gently. "You wouldn't even mention it if you didn't."

His eyes shimmer. "When did you turn into me?" he murmurs, more to himself than her.

She knows she doesn't need to respond.

He doesn't even pretend to resume working and the silence between them anticipates.

"I haven't just forgotten," she says, and it doesn't break harshly into the unmoving atmosphere.

He nods calmly. "I didn't think you had."

She knows he understands what she means perfectly. "I just… I didn't want you to think I was pretending it didn't happen."

Brown eyes catch blue in a mesmerising gaze. "I trust you."

_I trust you._

Three little words that mean more to her than the three she's supposed to spend her life pursuing. Is it absolute trust? She doubts it: he trusts her to keep her word and think about it, but not necessarily to ignore her first instinct to avoid potential problems by refusing to take risks.

"Thank you," she murmurs, shifting away from the unrelenting press of his eyes.

"You can talk to me about it, you know," he offers, steadily. "If you have questions, I mean."

She gives him a wry smile. "Can you honestly see either of us being able to discuss it rationally?"

He raises his eyebrows and she easily spots oncoming mockery in his grin. "Oh really? So, Dr Brennan doesn't think quite so rationally about me, hey? How interesting."

She glares at him and he holds his hands up in surrender.

"Okay, okay. I'll be good," he assures her, his wink contradicting his words.

_I'm sure you would be_, she shocks herself by thinking, then instantly scolds the little voice that piped up. It isn't the first time her inner voice has forced its way into her consciousness, but it is definitely getting bolder these days.

She's grateful for the distraction when her cell phone rings.

"Hi Jenny."

"Anything?" Her friend's voice is a strained seam about to burst.

"Not yet. But we're still looking," she adds hastily, ignoring Booth's _don't give false hope_ raised eyebrows.

"Remember that coffee shop next to the library?"

"The one without a name? It's still there?" She was sure they would have knocked it down by now.

"Yep, and Maggie recognised me," Jenny tells her, her tone underlined by a combination of surprise at how long ago it was and nostalgia for how recent it still seems. "No sign of Ryan, though," she tacks on, flatly. "I must have been wrong."

"She's still there? She's sure?" She tries not to echo Jenny's disappointment and realises she has been harbouring an unacknowledged instinct that the sudden flash of inspiration that had led Jenny back to their old campus would prove victorious.

"No sign?" Booth asks, looking up from the computer.

She relays Jenny's confirmation to him, watching his own barrier quickly collapse and be rebuilt. She knows his hope is fading and he is trying to hide it. Is this what they look like to other people's relatives all the time?

"Are you coming back?" she asks Jenny tentatively.

There is a brief silence on the other end of the line. "I thought I was on to something, Tempe. I really did."

"Me too," she concedes, unable to hide it any more. "But you should come back here now."

"Okay," Jenny whispers, devastation threaded through her voice. "I'll be back later tonight. I'll get a cab from the airport."

"No you won't," she tells her firmly. "I'll pick you up. Or Booth will. Just text me when you know the time."

"Tempe-"

"I mean it," she interrupts quickly. "It's not a problem and it will be easier for you."

Jenny sighs. "Right. Yes, I'll text you."

As they say their goodbyes, she wishes she was better at expressing emotion. Without Jenny in her life, she knows she would never have been able to allow Booth or Angela as close as they are. She owes the few close relationships she has to Jenny's persistent attempts at friendship; she was the first person to teach her that was okay to need to tell people things sometimes and that not everybody was going to use the information for their own ends.

Booth suddenly rises and moves to collect the baby carrier from the corner of the room. Other than a brief crying spell earlier in the day, the only noise emanating from Sarah has been a quiet, contented gurgling. Sometimes Brennan forgets there's a baby in the room.

"Lunch time," he announces, starting for the door. "I need food before I can do any more and you look like you could do with a break too."

"I should go to the office," she starts as she turns to follow, realising she hasn't set foot in the lab for nearly a week.

He barricades the doorway with his free arm. "No, you're coming to lunch. They'll call if they need you."

She stares at him, wondering if it's worth arguing. She suspects she'll lose eventually anyway. Instead, she catches him off-guard by swiftly leaning forwards and pressing her lips to his.

It isn't long enough to be called anything more than a peck, but it still reminds her of those swirling emotions he had provoked in her last time. She doesn't think she'll ever be able to suitably categorise his kiss.

"Come on then," she says, starting towards the elevator.

She knows without turning that she has left him stunned and can't help smiling when his exasperated tone calls her name after her.

* * *

At the diner, she hops out of the car as soon as he turns the engine off. He has spent the short drive muttering under his breath whilst she kept her head turned away so he couldn't see her trying to suppress her laughter.

She doesn't know why this streak of blithe disregard for consequences has suddenly swept through her; she only knows that in this moment she feels more light-hearted than someone whose friend is missing should.

_Ryan_.

Instantly, her mood switches again and she turns to Booth.

"I'm sorry," she says, quietly. "I shouldn't have done that."

He carefully unfastens and slides Sarah's carrier from the back seat, before resting the sleeping baby at his feet. His hand reaches to push her hair behind her ear, lingering on her cheek, and she wonders if it's normal to be flooded with warmth at the gesture.

"Bones," he murmurs, dipping his head slightly, "you can kiss me whenever you like as long as you know what it means."

She stares at him, seeing for the first time the potential she holds to hurt him. She has only once held this kind of responsibility before and that was for a man who was far happier with her friend that she ever could have made him. Booth is different, she knows. It's possible that she might be enough for him and that terrifies her even as she feels a strange sense of pride that a man like him wants her.

She nods, surprising him with a brief, tight hug, her arms looping around his waist as his hands slip over her shoulders. It isn't sexual; it is everything she would like to say but knows she can't at the moment. It is more of a recognition of their past friendship than the potential for their future.

As she breaks away, she smiles. "Come on. Lunch is on me."

He laughs. "I'm not going to fight that offer," he says, following her inside with the baby.

Inside, they find a table and settle Sarah's carrier on a spare seat, both sending a friendly wave towards Ramona behind the counter. Booth is quicker to divest himself of his coat and heads over to peer at the dessert in the glass cabinet.

"You're not just having four different types of dessert," she teases him from a few feet away.

He laughs. "No, I'm just planning ahead."

Ramona appears next to the table with her notebook. "Afternoon, honey. Your relationship moved on a bit in a few days?" She inclines her head towards the baby with a merry grin.

Brennan surprises herself by laughing rather than being embarrassed. "She's my friend's daughter. How are you?"

"Oh, I'm peachy. Can't wait till Christmas. My sons are both back this year."

_Christmas_. She has barely even remembered that it will be Christmas in three weeks. The cold weather has become so natural that she no longer associates it with the holiday season. It's been freezing for several weeks now.

"How about you, dear? What will you do for Christmas?" Ramona continues, leaning over to stroke the baby's cheek in a maternal fashion.

The question surprises her. She hasn't even considered her plans this year. "Oh, I, um. I don't know. I usually go away at Christmas. My job." She looks over to her partner, who is still debating between his familiar pie and a tempting meringue concoction. "Booth, you ready to order?"

He heads back to the table, flashing his usual charming smile at Ramona. "Hey, Ramona. Did I hear you say your sons were coming back? They'll eat you out of your house, remember."

Ramona laughs. "And I bet you were just like that when you came home from the army, my charming boy. Your mother probably despaired."

"She still does," he says, his grin widening. "I'll have a club sandwich and some potato wedges." He leans forward to whisper conspiratorially, "And if you could give me a few extra wedges I'd be eternally grateful, because Bones is bound to nick a few."

Brennan rolls her eyes. "I didn't know your sons were in the army," she says to Ramona, ignoring her partner's friendly poke in the shoulder as he sits down.

The older woman nods as she makes a note on her pad. "Both of them. Posted in Afghanistan over the last six months, but they'll be home in two weeks. What'll you have, hon?"

"Oh, um, I'll have the veggie enchilada with a dressed salad. They're not rangers, are they?"

Ramona shakes her head. "No, airborne infantry. They've both been in for years."

"You must worry," she says softly, suddenly thinking about how she would feel if Booth was abroad at war for months at a time. She controls the urge to shiver from the cold feeling in her veins.

"Of course, but they hate it when I show it." Ramona smiles thoughtfully. "And maybe it's not the job I'd have chosen for them, but they believe in it and I'm proud of them." She nudges Booth in the shoulder. "Same as your mother was, I bet."

As Ramona leaves with the orders, Brennan watches her partner's face cycle between wistfulness and unease. She can't tell what he's thinking and that alone is the giveaway. Booth is a man who wears his heart on his sleeve – until his thoughts veer towards his life in the army. He rarely talks and she doesn't push. She knows he will speak when he needs to.

"You know I'm going to steal your wedges just for the hell of it now?" she says, faking a cheerfulness far from her heart.

His expression slips easily back into its usual place, on the edge of a smile.

"Ah, you'd have done it even if I hadn't asked for extra." He plays with the fold of his napkin. "Did Jenny find out anything at all?"

She shakes her head. "It doesn't seem so. I thought maybe she would. But I didn't even wonder about how Ryan would have got there – after all, if he'd got on a plane we'd have a record of it."

Booth nods. "There's always a way, though, if somebody wants it enough. It wasn't a bad idea. And at least now we can rule it out." He sighs. "I've got alerts posted across the country for his social security and his photo is on the wire. I hate to say it, but we're almost better off if he ends up in hospital and someone finds his ID on him. There are an awful lot of brown-haired, average height men in the country."

She pulls a face. "That's if he even has his ID. I know Sarah says he took it, but I doubt keeping it on him has been the first thing on his mind."

He hesitates. "You said yesterday he'd done this before? What happened then?"

She is about to reply when Ramona slides their plates in front of them and the smell wafting towards her reminds her she hasn't eaten since she put Jenny on the plane in the early hours of the morning. Her fork is splitting open her enchilada before she really thinks about it, watching the melting cheese slide over the vegetables. Booth reaches over and spears a green bean quickly.

"Oi," she exclaims, glaring at him. "Eat your own food."

"You'll eat mine," he reminds her with a grin. "Anyway, go on, you were going to say something."

She chews slowly as she organises her thoughts. "He was diagnosed after he finished his PhD, although it's easier now to connect some of the things he did when I first knew him. Since I got back in touch with Jenny, he's been mostly fine. Like she says, they're told not to think in terms of 'normal', but if you didn't know him and only saw them occasionally, you would never guess he was bipolar. Partly the medication, I assume, but also because he's learned to recognise his own condition and react to the warning signs." She stabs a tomato, knowing he will see her frustration in the action but not caring. "I don't know much about the condition – to be honest, I find it hard to understand – but I've picked up information from Jenny and done a bit of reading. It's described as bipolar II disorder, which is more prone to depressive episodes than extreme mania, although he does occasionally experience hypomanic periods. I don't… I haven't really seen him in one of those, but Jenny talks about it like it's an extreme increase in energy and restlessness and can be incredibly productive." She frowns at her food. "I know that sounds like a good thing, but it's all part of it and it's the come-down that's the problem."

Booth nods. "We get some training on things like this."

She smiles sadly. "The stupid thing is, I did all this research and it never really made me see what it would be like living with him. I only see him during his good times – and although his good times have got more frequent since he was diagnosed, I don't know how Jenny copes with the depressive episodes. For the couple of years before Sarah was born he was relatively stable – I think that's why they decided to risk having the baby – but she seemed to spark some kind of panic in him. He _thinks_ so much." She takes another mouthful, still a little unsettled by being so hungry when her instinct tells her that she should expend all her efforts for her friends.

"What about psychosis?" Booth asks reluctantly, not meeting her eyes. "I've got to ask, I know it can be a symptom."

She chuckles wryly. "You seem to know more about it than I do. It can be, but it's not one that Ryan has ever experienced, to my knowledge. He's always aware of himself and the reality of his surroundings."

"And he's disappeared before? How did Jenny describe it, something about taking himself out of circulation?"

She absentmindedly steals one of his potato wedges. "I've only heard her talk about it – like I said, he's been pretty much okay since we got back in touch. But she says he's never been gone this long before – it's normally only a day or so and he's back. I haven't… I don't ask her lots of questions. I don't think she likes talking about it."

Booth takes a huge bite of his sandwich, forcing him to chew without speaking for a few moments. "Okay. Let's start again. It's Wednesday. Jenny came to you last Thursday. She last saw him leaving for work on Tuesday morning, but she didn't know he'd not got there until she phoned his office later than day."

She doesn't say anything. He doesn't need corroboration; he's just reassessing what little they do know.

"He's been gone over a week," he sighs, leaning back in his chair and running his hands dispiritedly back through his hair, tugging slightly.

She wants to move over and hold his head against her chest, reassure him that she knows he's doing his best. Her fingers itch to smooth down the agitated peaks of his hair, feel his arms slide around her waist as he lets her comfort him.

She grips the edge of the table to stop herself.

"If he doesn't have any ID," she says slowly, "how will anybody recognise him if he _is_ hurt?"

He shrugs his shoulders. "Fingerprints are a possibility – will he be in the system? Ever worked for the military, the government, something like that?"

She shakes her head. "No – and he's not been arrested, before you ask."

He smiles ruefully. "Damn. You lot really should have got in more trouble when you were younger." He takes another bite of his food and flicks to a page of his notebook. "And Maryland doesn't require fingerprints for a driving licence, so that's out – even if we were convinced he had one anyway."

"I've never known him drive," she says, repeating an earlier assertion. "But we can check with Jenny when she's back."

"No point," he reminds her. "And I expect you're right and he's never had a licence. I wouldn't know if his condition prohibits it. I should probably check that." He writes himself a reminder.

"Honey, you want me to save you the last piece of that pie?" Ramona cuts in, clearing the table next to them. "It's apple and blackberry. The next one out will be rhubarb."

Brennan almost laughs at the serious consideration Booth gives his pie choice. Food is a very solemn matter for him, she reminds herself.

"Save me it, please," he tells Ramona.

The waitress nods. "You want anything, Tempe?"

Booth raises his eyebrows in surprise at the use of her first name. She ignores him.

"No thanks, I'll finish the rest of his wedges," she replies merrily, casting a glance at her partner as he glares at her.

"She called you Tempe," he says quietly as Ramona departs.

She nods. "I told her to." She shrugs her shoulders. "Well, it is my name."

He frowns. "I've only ever heard about six people call you that."

"I don't let just anyone call me Bones, you know," she teases him.

He laughs. "I should hope not." His tone is light, but his eyes remind her that the name – however silly – is part of their connection.

She reaches across the table to squeeze his hand, her fingers lingering long beyond a friendly gesture. "I wouldn't want anyone else to," she says softly, looking straight at him.

As she studies him, she wonders if he can tell how a few hours are helping to make her mind up. When he kissed her two weeks ago, she had been surprised, confused and more scared than she cared to admit. Now, all she can think about is kissing him again with only the delicious tingle of anticipation between them.

* * *

**This was my most difficult chapter to produce, so I hope chapter 9 will be quicker in arriving in my head! I think there's probably two or three more to go.**

**My usual postscript - I love the reviews and I reply to as many as I can, admittedly sometimes later than I'd like. I'll never demand them, but I can't help agreeing with other authors that they do help inspire me to write more!**


	9. Chapter 9

**There's only so many times one author can apologise for being slow. I think my only remaining defence is that I refuse to publish work I'm not happy with myself and unfortunately I don't seem to be able to recapture the inspiration I used to have. When I posted my final chapter of 'Rekindling' I honestly thought I would be able to finish this story quickly, but life got in the way: I was made redundant in July and my worry about that kind of overran everything else in my life. I've got another job now and life is on a far more even keel, so voila! (And sorry for telling you all completely irrelevant facts from my life when you just want to read the story!)  
**

**So, take yourself back two years, to when I first started this. Remember that I haven't seen any of Season 5, never mind episode 100 or the few episodes of Season 6 that have been shown in the UK. It was a simpler time, and one my fanfiction still seems to live in! Inconsistencies with current canon are most likely down to me being behind.**

**A special shoutout for cathmarchr: she sent me some extremely considerate reviews recently at the point when I thought I would never return to fanfiction. There have been a few other recent reviewers who have made me push on with this chapter. Knowing people are still reading has really helped me.**

**Any mistakes are my own and come from a desperation to actually finish this story at some point in my life!**

* * *

He counts the holes in the ceiling tiles and thinks about her. With a wry smile, he congratulates himself on multi-tasking.

He knows he is letting himself hope and doesn't like it; he's always promised himself that he wouldn't let wishful thinking triumph. But today she has been different. Despite the circumstances – circumstances that, as usual, he wishes he could make disappear with a click of his fingers – he feels that today she – _they_ – made progress.

It was only the briefest touch of her lips, but he holds it in his mind as a turning point. _She_ initiated it. It hadn't been him losing control or the heat of the moment blurring their boundaries. This time, she had chosen to kiss him and his heart had beaten faster for long moments following it.

He had been too shocked to do what he had promised himself he would when he kissed her again. He hadn't been able to hold her against him and show her quite why their previous kiss had left her haunted. Instead, she had danced off down the corridor, leaving him to wonder when she became the aggressor in their relationship.

With a grin, he vows _that_ won't last. He'll show her quite how dominant he can be – and now he thinks she'll like it.

He glances at the arrivals board, noting that the flight is still on time. The traffic was surprisingly light and he is early, but he doesn't mind. Although he is usually impatient, for the moment he is happy to have the space to think about her.

He doesn't know what he feels and doesn't want to start categorising. Does he love her? It isn't a question he can answer definitively yet – but even though it's not one he's sure he wants or needs to even _ask_ himself at the moment, he can't help wondering. What he feels for her isn't the issue – he knows he feels enough to want to make a relationship work. It is what _she_ feels that matters now. He doesn't want to think about what will happen if she decides not to take a chance on them.

He remembers the feel of her in his arms earlier, when he had known what she was trying to say without either of them speaking. He knows she is torn between the safety of their friendship, that unbreakable rock, and the exhilarating potential of what they could be. He felt the tremor in her body two weeks ago and knew then that she wanted him. Whatever she feels, he knows she wants him. The physical has been there longer than the emotions that have almost surpassed it now. Two years ago, it might have been enough for them to give in to the brutally magnetic attraction between them; now, he knows that would only make it worse. He is prepared to wait until she knows what she wants rather than give in to her instinctual urge to charge headlong into anything she can't quite comprehend.

_Landed_, says the arrivals board. He knows he'll have another few minutes before the plane empties completely.

He wonders what it would be like to know for certain that he was the only man in her life. She can be so casual in her treatment of men, but he knows that anything between them couldn't be like that. If they are together – and he remembers that it's still _if_ – then he's sure she will understand that she can't play with his heart. She knows him too well to think otherwise.

As the first person appears through the gate, he rises, looking for the woman who means so much to his partner.

When he sees her, despair overwhelms him. Yesterday afternoon, at their first encounter, he had noticed her paleness and those dark shadows that threatened to engulf her eyes. But today she seems listless, hopelessness patterning her expression, her head cast low as she walks. He can't imagine how she feels, with the most important person in her life missing. He wonders how similar it was to those terrible hours he thought he had lost his lifeline to the Gravedigger.

"Jenny," he says, to get her attention.

Her head raises and he follows his instincts, folding her into his arms in comfort. She doesn't cry, but he feels her shake fitfully as her hands grip his shoulders.

"It's okay," he soothes, even though he knows it isn't. It won't be okay until she has Ryan back.

Her fingers stay clenched in the thick material of his coat as she levers herself away. "I'm sorry."

He shakes his head. "I'm going to tell you there's nothing to be sorry about and I hope that deep down you know that."

She smiles tiredly. "Thank you for picking me up. I really appreciate it."

He takes her bag from her – they had thought she might be away for the night – with a look that brooks no argument. "Ah, no worries. I left Bones with Sarah, didn't think it would be good to drag the little one out this late at night."

"Thank you," she repeats, seeming genuinely grateful. "Sarah sleeps well, but she doesn't like being disturbed. And she likes Tempe."

Booth chuckles quietly. "So it seems. Who'd have guessed?"

Jenny smiles again. "Oh, there's a maternal side buried in there somewhere. You just have to find it."

He doesn't reply, his mind filling with questions, and they walk to the car in comfortable silence. As he turns the key in the ignition, he glances over at her.

"So," he starts, evenly, "I'm going to ask you things. And you don't have to tell me the answers to anything." He takes his eyes off the road for just a second to look at her puzzled face. "What I mean is, I'm asking because I want to know. Not for any good reason. And I don't want you to feel that you have to tell me things you've promised to keep secret."

Her eyes widen as she understand him. "You want to ask me about Tempe."

He nods and watches her debate with her conscience.

"I'll answer if I can," she says eventually, seeming happy with her decision. "I've seen and heard about you enough to know you're hardly likely to be out to damage her."

Normally he would be angry with anyone who even suggested it but Jenny is not like anyone else in his partner's life; she has earned the right to be suspicious and he hasn't yet gained her complete trust. He's prepared to work for it.

"What am I missing?" he asks curiously, glancing sideways at her as he pulls out of the airport. "She tells me so little about her life before Washington and after her parents left. I just want to know what she was like. Whether she's changed."

Jenny seems to consider her answer carefully. "I suppose she's like all of us," she begins, slowly, "some things have changed and some not at all." She smiles. "She was always this pedantic. And precise. No good news there, I'm afraid, I think that's a permanent feature. And she never took to people easily – it always took her a long time to get to know someone. I think I caught her at a moment of weakness when she was so unused to finding anything difficult that she didn't think to mistrust me. Ryan – well, she fell hard for Ryan, granted, but I don't think she ever _enjoyed_ being in love. She certainly resented the hold it had over her." Jenny twists her fingers together briefly, clearly thinking back to over a decade previously. "She wanted control – that hasn't changed either – and I suppose being in love took that away from her. Not like me. I thought it was exhilarating, knowing there was nothing I could do about it. Finally, something I couldn't organise, however hard I tried."

"Exhilarating if it's reciprocal," he slips in, thoughtfully. "Not so much when you're in on your own."

She looks at him oddly, but he can't categorise it; she seems to want to say something, then thinks better of it.

"Anyway, in those ways she's the same," she continues, wistfully. "I'd like her to change – I think she'd find it so much easier if she let things go, let people in more. But then I get why she's like this – and I still love her, whatever I say," she adds, almost defensively.

He reaches over to pat her arm. "It's all right. I'd change those things about her, too," is all he says, but he knows Jenny understands. He doesn't judge her for wanting more for her friend.

"She _has_ changed in some ways, though," Jenny resumes, more brightly. "She's more… Tolerant. Accepting, maybe. I know it might not seem it to you, but compared to when she was younger, she definitely is. She accepts her own weaknesses more. She doesn't keep trying to 'fix' other people – well, not like she did, believe me," she qualifies, as he chuckles. "And all I've heard since we got back in touch is Booth this, Booth that. You've clearly made an impression."

He shrugs, trying to hide the delight he feels at knowing she talks about him. "We spend a lot of time together," he says, trying to be casual.

"Don't hide it from me," she says, softly, before going on before he has a chance to respond. "She seems better. Happier is probably the wrong word. Less conflicted is probably better. She told me about you to finding out about her mother – it seems to have helped her a bit."

"Her mother, yes. Her father, er, I'm not so sure. Max is… Interesting," he concludes, letting her earlier comment slide. He's fed up of denying it these days.

Jenny nods. "She's told me. Well, most of it. I imagine I don't want to know the bits she hasn't told me."

"Probably not," he agrees, wondering if he dares to ask his next question.

_If you don't ask now, you know you'll never dare ask her_, the annoying voice in his head reminds him.

He's almost relieved: the two voices in his head have been strangely quiet over the past day, despite the hours spent with his partner, their favourite subject.

"And Ryan?" he says, hesitantly.

"What about Ryan?" she asks, curiously rather than defensively.

"You have to admit, it's strange. A grand, passionate love affair – even you said they were head over heels – and then he ends up with her friend." He suddenly realises how he sounds. "I'm not… That sounded – accusatory. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to imply you were the big bad wolf in all this.

Jenny stares ahead for a few moments and he wonders if he's upset her.

_Fantastic, man, the first of Bones' non-work friends you meet and you insult her. That's a really good move._

"Maybe I am the big bad wolf," she says suddenly, her voice shaking a little. "Sometimes I think I am."

"Jenny-"

"No, I'm not upset with you. And in a lot of ways – most ways – I've come to terms with what happened. But I still wonder, sometimes, if they were meant to be together. If I should have worked harder to get her to stay with him. Or if I should have walked away when I realised I felt too much for him." She laughs slightly. "Then I know I love him too much to believe he should be with someone else. My regret isn't being with him. But maybe it _is_ not trying hard enough to make her see what she was throwing away before I thought of him as anything other than my best friend's boyfriend."

"I think…" He hesitates; despite his many orations on love, the elusive connection, he rarely speaks of it in personal terms. "I think maybe we should all abandon the idea of the one single person for someone. Maybe it's more that there's one person who's right for you at a given time in your life. Maybe Ryan was the one for Bones when they were together. It doesn't mean he hasn't continued to be the one for you for far longer. If you try to take away your own guilt, try to look at it from an outside perspective, do you really think they would ever have created the kind of relationship you and Ryan have together?"

There is a pause before she shakes her head – and again that odd look in her eyes as she shifts in her seat to face him.

"Is she the one for you right now?" she asks, her voice low and tentative.

He knows he should deny it; he should trot out the 'just partners' line and hope she sees enough in his expression to drop it, like everyone else does. But these days he's tired of hiding it – and she so clearly already knows _something_ that he doubts she would believe his lie.

"I hope so," he replies, simply, suddenly unable to voice quite what she means – and could mean – to him.

She nods. "You kissed her."

He frowns. "She told you?"

The answering "No" is accompanied by an attempt at contrition, but he can see she's not really sorry.

"I overheard," Jenny admits. "I wasn't trying to – well, not at first. But I was curious, so when you said more than just goodbye in the hallway last night, I didn't stop myself listening."

He smiles wryly. He's not mad.

"Do you love her?"

This time he knows his answer. He's spent so long asking himself the same question that it doesn't even shock him that somebody else has asked.

"I'm not sure yet," he responds, softly. He doesn't think he had ever spoken of this before. "As my friend, my partner, a big part of my life, I know I do. As more, I know I could – but I don't think I will until she lets me."

"But you do feel more than just a close friendship? That feeling I can never name, the one that tells you this could be something more than you can even imagine." Jenny smiles thoughtfully and he knows she is thinking of Ryan.

"Anticipation," he says, slowly. "And maybe a bit like that terrifying excitement you feel whenever you approach something new as a kid. Knowing that this could all go wrong – and knowing that it's worth the risk."

There are tears in Jenny's eyes and suddenly this isn't about him any more.

"I risked it for him," she whispers, through the effort of her blinking eyes. "I'd still risk it. I even put my closest friendship on the line, and I knew that Tempe might not forgive me. It seems less, in hindsight, knowing she _has_ forgiven me, but then… Then I felt like I was betraying someone in a way that would always haunt me. And I still thought he was worth it." She takes a deep shuddering breath. "Does he not believe that? I used to think I could get through to him even during the bad periods, but now I'm worried he's never listened, never believed I love him more than I've ever been able to tell him."

He's not used to this: the honesty and the pain she allows him to see shocks him. Her openness contrasts fiercely with his partner's usual reticence – Bones rarely discloses anything until she is forced.

"It's more likely that he feels he's not enough," he ventures, tentatively. He dislikes speaking on subjects he isn't completely sure of. "From what you say, his bad periods are darker than maybe we can imagine. And he looks at you and wonders how you can ever love him – and then when he thinks you can't, he tries to leave you behind. Maybe it's his way of saving you, showing he loves you enough to let you go. And with Sarah, that feeling must be doubled." He sighs. "I'm being too simplistic; it's a medical condition I shouldn't comment on. But a lesser version of that is surely what we all feel when we fall in love? We always think the other person is too good for us and could never reciprocate – that's part of what makes you fall for them in the first place."

Jenny twists her fingers together, the tears still flowing but silently now. "It should be the other way round," she murmurs, so quietly he barely hears.

He is puzzled. "What do you mean?"

She lifts her head and even through the red blotches her crying has brought, she is beautiful because she lights up as speaks of the man she loves.

"I could never be too good for him. He doesn't get it, can't see it. He's the one who sometimes seems too good for me. Yes, he's bipolar – but so what? I don't dismiss it, but it's one facet of his personality, not something that engulfs everything else. He's so, so clever – even Tempe will tell you that – and I'm no slouch when it comes to numbers but in everything else he'd win. And you should see him when he's in a good phase – he's funny and interesting and so good with Sarah. I know he's left us now, but he dotes on her. He was so worried when I was pregnant and now he thinks all the time about what will happen if she's like him. I told him we'd always be looking for it, that if she develops signs then we'll be able to help her far earlier than he was diagnosed. All he thinks is that it'll be his fault." Jenny stops, out of breath, and realises they are pulling down a road she recognises. "Oh, I'm sorry. I met you yesterday and I've just gone completely 'bleurgh' on you." She blushes. "I promise I'm normally more restrained with strangers."

He smiles. "I don't mind," he assures her, his sentiment genuine. "Makes a change for someone to tell me how much they love someone rather than insisting they had no choice but to kill them and dispose of their body in undeniably imaginative ways. I get a lot of that at work."

She laughs. "And you're not a total cynic yet? I would be."

He pulls a face. "I'm definitely a cynic about what people have the potential to do. Or be, for that matter. But I find my life goes along more easily when I'm able to think well of people, even if I'm sometimes proved wrong." He draws up alongside a familiar building. "Besides, I have to counteract Dr Everything's-just-biology, don't I? Someone has to have a little faith in instinct."

She smiles, but her tone is serious when she speaks again. "Honestly, do you think we'll find him?"

He hesitates, unsure of his own ability to comfort in a lie. "I think we will," he says, slowly, "but I would be wrong not to admit I'm worried about _how_ we find him."

"You think he's hurt?" Her voice trembles.

He's an honest man, he reminds himself. "I know from experience that most missing persons – the ones who don't decide to resurface of their own accord – are found because they're in hospital or jail," he admits.

He can't bring himself to mention the other common option: the medical examiner's table.

She exhales sharply. "Okay," is all she says, before she opens the door and steps from the car.

He encounters this type of case every day, but this is just too personal. Normally, he steps into and out of lives; he doesn't live with the endless capacity for frustration and grief that radiates from Jenny. He wonders what she's like when her heart isn't breaking and hopes he will one day find out.

He follows her into the building and watches her as they wait for the elevator. Like Angela, she is so different to his partner that they complement each other. Yet he sees that where Angela wears her heart on her sleeve and heads straight for any problem, Jenny's earlier display of emotion is rare; probably not as rare as Tempe's, but certainly unusual enough to mark her current state as erratic.

In the elevator, he squeezes her shoulder, smiling comfortingly at her when she turns to face him. "Maybe Sarah's awake," he suggests.

Her eyes fill with tears of contrasting love and fear. "I need her right now," she confesses softly, turning her face away as they arrive on the correct floor.

He opens the door with his borrowed key – his emergency one lives in his desk drawer in his office – and enters quietly. It's late and he isn't sure if both of those he left behind will be sleeping.

Temperance is lying prone on the sofa, the baby on her chest, a blanket thrown over them both. Her hand moves soothingly across Sarah's back; the light of the quietened television and the dim lamp in the corner plays across them, patterning their skin in muted colour.

"They're home," he hears her murmur, the movement of her hand not ceasing. "Hey, little one, that's the door, Mummy's home now."

He still can't quite reconcile the two Dr Brennans he now finds in his life. The professional scientist he knows inside-out is being blurred by the woman he sees brought out by Sarah. It's disconcerting because now he realises he doesn't know her as well as he has congratulated himself he does; it's comforting because now he can let himself see how they might work together beyond the professional. He sees that one day she might be able to allow herself to think of a family not as a hurdle but as a support. One day their futures might not be so opposite.

"Hey," Jenny whispers, crouching beside the sofa, her hand automatically moving to caress her daughter's head. "How's she been?"

Sarah snuffles slightly, wriggling a little.

"Fractious," Temperance whispers back. "I tried putting her to bed, but she wouldn't settle. I tried milk, I tried teething gel, but she doesn't seem happy. I think she wants you, Jen."

Jenny slips Sarah into her arms. "I'll take her." She leans down to kiss her friend on the cheek. "Thank you. I don't know how I'd be managing without you." She looks up at Booth. "Both of you."

He doesn't think he's ever seen his partner blush like this before and he can't help thinking the sudden colour suits her.

As Jenny bears her daughter away to the spare room, Temperance swings her legs around to make room for him. Accepting the unspoken invitation, he drops his jacket on the chair opposite and settles his long form next to her. Her eyes are heavy and her hair tangled from lying down and maybe it's her sleepiness that makes him risk sliding his arm around her. She unexpectedly turns to him for a hug and he feels his skin tingle as she relaxes against him; there is no sign she wishes to break from his embrace and he lets himself sink back into the cushions, his arms tightening slightly.

"You okay?" he murmurs against her hair.

He feels her answering nod.

"How's Jenny?" she asks, stifling a yawn.

"Holding it together," he tells her, keeping his voice low. "I don't know how much longer she can, though."

She twists her neck to look up at him. "Is there ever a point at which we give up?" she asks, tremulously.

He bites his lip. "Yes," he forces himself to say, "but I don't want to think about it yet."

She turns her face into his shoulder and he thinks she's trying not to cry.

"I can't even imagine how she would be without him. Not now," she says softly. "It felt all wrong when I found out they were together, but if I ever thought it was possible for two people to be perfect for each other, it would be them."

He twists a strand of her hair round his finger. "She still feels guilty, you know," he says, recalling the conversation in the car.

She doesn't answer for a moment. "I don't think I can fix that. She won't believe me when I tell her that it was the best thing for all of us. I even reminded her that Ryan and I split up months before they got together." She turns in his arms and he sees the authenticity of her speech in her face. "If I had stayed with him, I would never have ended up here."

He thinks this is the first time he had ever seen her guard drop completely and he wonders how much it has taken her to show this level of vulnerability. He knows this is his crossroads and she is leaving the choice in his hands. Three years ago, she would never have released her control enough to let him guide her.

"Is this where you want to be?" he murmurs, letting his forehead drop to rest against hers.

She pulls her bottom lip between her teeth, nervously. "Yes," she breathes, her hand skimming his shoulder on its way to his face. Her fingers settle against his cheek, her touch almost tentative.

He slides his own hand up her back to the nape of her neck, tilting his body towards her to guide her down. Their bodies move slowly and there is no mistaking his intent, but her eyes never leave his. He knows now that she has made her decision and the voice inside him that forced him to wait is quietly satisfied.

Her other hand moves up over his side to grasp the material covering his back, pulling him onto her, seemingly uncaring of his weight. She shifts slightly beneath him, the fingers on his cheek threading into his hair. Soft curves press into the harder planes of his body and the rapid rise and fall of her breasts gives away her nervous excitement. He can hear his own breathing as it mingles with hers and wishes he could bottle the way he feels right now.

"Kiss me," she whispers, her voice catching slightly.

He knows that if he does, this time there is no going back. They only have so many chances to turn away from what is building between them and this is their last one.

"Are you sure?" He is asking because he needs to know she too recognises that there won't be the option to reverse and follow the road not taken.

She raises her eyebrows incredulously. "You told me I could kiss you whenever I liked as long as I knew what it meant." She lifts her head from the cushion to move her lips against his ear, her breath hot against his skin. "I know what it means, Booth. Are you telling me you don't?"

He turns his head so that their lips touch, his words spoken through soft tingles and a smouldering glow that he half expects to see surrounding them. "I've always known," he breathes, as she sinks back, his mouth following hers.

It isn't like the first kiss, the one that seems so much further in the past than only two weeks. It still isn't calm and his heart is still beating too fast for him to think straight, but this time he knows which way her head will tilt and can sense the moment when her lips will part. His head spins and he wishes he could read her mind, just so he could know whether she feels like this too. The hand in his hair holds his head in place, almost as if she is determined to resist him pulling away like he did last time. He has no intention of stopping until he's forced to.

Her other hand moves from his back to grasp his own free one, her long fingers interlocking with his. She breaks the kiss just long enough to snatch a shuddering breath; he has barely had time to register the pause before she is drawing him back towards her in one fluid movement. He has no concept of time.

He knows she will be able to feel how much he wants her, but he doesn't feel self-conscious like he has always expected. Because now, even if it might not be quite so obvious, he knows she wants him just as much. The way her hips are pressing upwards and her erratic breathing now verges on panting gives her away, even before the moan that breaks from her lips as he thrusts against her.

By the time a voice in his head reminds him that he's a gentleman and that this is not a good night to make the transition all the way from friends to lovers, his hand is cupping her breast, stroking and fondling through layers of material he wishes would melt away. He doesn't try to resist the temptation to swipe his thumb over her swollen nipple, his delight in her stifled cry rippling through him; but then he forces himself to still his hand and separate their melded lips.

"No," she gasps, refusing to let his mouth escape as she raises her head in pursuit of his withdrawal.

"Shhh," he soothes, pressing lightly against her shoulder so that she falls back to the sofa. His own breathing mirrors hers and he feels like his heartbeat will never return to normal.

"I wish you wouldn't think so much," she grumbles, her hands slowly stroking his back.

He trails a finger down her flushed cheek. "And I never thought you would be the one saying that," he teases her.

She smiles, almost shyly. "There's always a point when a woman stops thinking," she says, catching him off-guard with a kiss that only promises what they're capable of.

"And this is the point," he counters, rising and pulling her to her feet, "when this particular woman goes to bed."

She pulls a face. "Are you coming with me?"

He holds her against his chest, feeling the tremble in her body as he strokes her back. "You know now isn't the right time."

Her hands slide up over his shoulders to draw him down into another kiss, deeper than the previous. This time, she controls it, her tongue sweeping through his mouth as her body pushes against him; he feels the blood pounding in his head and is only surprised there's any left to power his brain. He doesn't think he's ever been so aroused and can't quite understand how he's still resisting her.

"I think any time is the right time," she murmurs against his lips.

He sighs. "Somehow I'm not surprised."

She stays within the circle of his arms but settles back from his face to hold him more loosely. "But I want the right time for both of us," she says gently, meeting his eyes. "Staying on the couch? There's no point you going home."

He nods. "I'll get my bag from the car."

She chuckles. "Always so prepared."

Before he leaves, he steals one final kiss, waiting until her knees buckle and only his body is holding her up before breaking away. He makes sure she won't stumble before he takes away his support.

"The right time is never that far away," floats over his shoulder, tantalisingly.

Two hours later, when the ringing of his cell phone disturbs his intermittent sleep, he wonders if answering the call will help or hinder them on their way to their right time.

* * *

**Anyone who's read my work before will know I never feel like readers owe me reviews, simply because I am so bad at reciprocating. That doesn't stop me hoping that people will find the time to even just write a couple of sentences!**


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